Sustainability is the word on everyone’s lips at the moment. Both for consumers and brands. A survey conducted by McKinsey found that 67% of people now consider the use of sustainable materials to be an important factor when making their purchasing decisions, whilst 63% will also consider a brand’s promotion of sustainability in the same way. This is an amazing step forward in raising awareness around the environmental impact of fast fashion and the possible dangers ahead if we don’t change our current habits.

Sustainability checklist:

When assessing how sustainable a company is, look for the following:

• Third party certifications (like whether they are Fairtrade of have B-corp status).

• If the company has an environmental policy and/or targets.

• If the company actively monitors their material, energy, CO2e, and water usage. These can usually be found in a ‘sustainability report’.

• If they’re using organic materials or fibres which are designed to minimise environmental impact (like recycled as opposed to virgin polyester).

• If they are transparent about their labour. In other words, is it easy to find out who their workers are and under which conditions they are working in?

• If the company has financial relationships with other brands criticised for their ethical considerations.

From looking at a company’s website, to checking the labels on our products, verifying whether a brand is truly sustainable isn’t always quick and easy. But it is an important step in combating fast fashion (and indeed climate change altogether) as well as ensuring that the workers are being fairly paid.

And there are an increasing number of websites and tools springing up to help. Take a look at Bendi for a brilliantly simple way to see immediately the sustainability credentials of children’s clothes sold by Next, John Lewis and H&M (it’s both enlightening and shocking!)