Sole Responsibility
We are part of a connected ecosystem and it’s our responsibility to make better choices to benefit our customers, employees, and the planet. People and community have always been the heart of what we do, and with 70 years of business under our belt, it’s time to widen the scope of our commitment. We recognise our environmental responsibility to protect the planet for future generations and are making steps toward a more sustainable future.
Our mission, "Together we create to inspire", means continuing to create better practices and better innovations that offer inspiration for our people. We are working towards incorporating sustainability in all aspects of our business, from our people to our practices, the materials we use, and more. There are many levels to our responsibility and we are determined to create change to challenge our environmental impact.
Doing More, With Less.
Fashion has historically been one of the world’s most polluting industries, and footwear is no different.
To make incremental steps forward in reducing our impact on the world we have identified lots of small initiatives that impact ALL areas of the business.
Some important wins are:
In Our Stores:
- Repurposing store fixtures when we move or open new stores.
- Recycling printed store signage to be re-useable, eliminating reprinting and freight.
- Installing digital screens as we upgrade stores to reduce and eventually eliminate printing and installation of seasonal images.
- Ensuring product is moved from store to store in the most economical way, e.g. Stock moved within the South island if possible to reduce emissions where we can.
- Packaging initiatives, all Merchant bags and shoe boxes are recycled and recyclable with a removable handle to eliminate the need for an additional carry bag.
- We have transitioned to Post-consumer recycled Courier bags.
- Offering our Workshop services to repair and revive leather shoes, to prolong their lifespan in your wardrobe.
In Our Support Office:
- E- Cycling all electronic waste.
- Transitioned all our company cars to Hybrid vehicles, reducing petrol consumption and emissions significantly.
- Implemented the use of an Interactive Digital screen for meetings to allow all teams to attend Teams virtually, reducing the need for commuting and travel.
- Interacting with International suppliers through Zoom and Microsoft Teams meetings to reduce international travel.
- Introduced two days of working from home for our Support Office to reduce the environmental impact of commuting and to recognize work-life balance is important to our teams.
In Our Factory:
- Recycling all plastic shoe lasts and metal cutting dies in our factory.
- Use small runs of leftover leather for smaller runs of our product.
- Increasing use of LWG ( Leather Working Group) leather in our production.
- Optimizing all freight in order to package and ship our goods in the most economical and environmental way.
- Eliminating all PP Non-Woven packaging and polystyrene forms from our packaging.
- Fitting samples. Only half pairs are sent for fitting, to ensure the correct fit of all styles. Pairs used for models and marketing are sold at outlets or donated to various charities.
- Re-dyeing unused seasonal coloured leather rather than disposing of it.
- All areas of the factory that produce fumes are fully ventilated and the fumes are filtered to remove any toxic substances so they are not released into the environment.
- All left- over glues or hazardous wastes are removed by accredited specialists, and handling must comply with a safety data sheet for the use of each chemical.
- Container optimization to reduce our freight footprint and emissions.
