Gucci Goes Circular and implements a Circular Hub to help reduce its environmental impact from design to manufacturing.
High-end luxury companies tend to have a bad reputation when it comes to the environment. Many brands are known for charging exorbitant prices to the consumer while underpaying their employees, using unsustainable materials and consistently contributing to the problem of textile waste. One high-end Italian fashion company is trying to rectify this image by launching the first hub for circular luxury in Italy.
Gucci, known for its Italian-crafted leather accessories and apparel, is working with Kering to help reduce its environmental impact. Kering is a French-based corporation that specializes in luxury goods. It owns high-end companies such as Gucci, Yves Saint Laurent, and Alexander McQueen. Gucci is dedicated to developing a more sustainable and responsible luxury market by protecting the environment, caring for its employees and customers, and creating innovative solutions for sustainable success.
The Circular Hub will accelerate the circular transformation of the Italian fashion industry’s production model and support the creation of circular luxury products. This model will be launched in Gucci’s production sites, raw material suppliers, and manufacturers of finished products. The Circular Hub will focus on four main areas.
1: Research and Development: Experts from the Kering Material Innovation Lab, technicians and product researchers from Gucci will analyze the most innovative technological and digital solutions that can be used to promote a circular model. They will also look at ways to produce quality, durability, repairability and recyclability.
2: Logistics: With support from the manufacturers, the team will look at how to include traceability to the products and how to increase logistics efficiency for unused materials. They will also look at distribution channels for recycling and reuse.
3: Industrial partnerships: The team will create various partnerships to develop solutions for recovering textiles and raw materials and promote manufacturing reuse.
4: Value sharing: The overall goal is to develop recovery, recycling and reuse processes within Gucci’s supply chain and to use these processes for other companies. The team hopes to increase the number of suppliers and partners who are interested and committed to helping these luxury companies become more sustainable.
Using Gucci to implement the Circular Hub will positively impact the luxury fashion industry. It will improve the company’s environmental performance, minimize natural resources and textile waste use, and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Kering hopes that this Circular Hub will promote the development of a “circular Made in Italy.” Doing so will be important to minimize the environmental and social impacts of Italian manufacturing and raw material supply chains.
The Circular Hub will create a total circular transformation of the Italian fashion industry’s production model through the redefinition of the entire value chain. These solutions will be an important model for how the fashion industry can reduce its environmental impact from design and raw materials to manufacturing. Gucci is the first high-end company to implement this model, but if successful, more brands will follow suit, and this industry will gain a sustainable reputation.
