Product Stewardship

The gear and apparel we design and sell to help our members have a great outdoor recreation experience can contribute to environmental and social harms. As with the operational side of our business, our desire is to identify the negative consequences of products. Through creativity and innovation, we will begin to not only reduce the negatives, but eventually craft solutions which have net benefits for the planet.

We are just beginning this process. We understand that looking at the full lifecycle of products and working with others to make changes requires a real investment. It also requires collaboration with companies across our industry and the greater supply chain. We have learned much from companies that have been working in this area before us and we hope to share our learnings in order to help our industry and others make progress.

Our first step has been to the work of establishing a vision and definition for "product stewardship" at REI and start trying to measure product impacts.

Highlights

In 2007 we introduced REI's ecoSensitive label with more than 40 branded apparel styles, identifying select items that have improved environmental performance compared to their conventional counterparts. We started with an emphasis on fabrics with a high percentage of renewable, recycled, and/or organic fibers — organic cotton, bamboo, hemp, organic wool, post-industrial recycled polyester, recycled polyethylene terephthalate (PET) plastic and polylactic acid (PLA).

We also worked with a group of colleagues in the Outdoor Industry Association to launch the OIA Eco-Index working group. With nearly 70 brands, the group is sharing collective knowledge and developing a common framework to measure, report and ultimately improve on the environmental impact of outdoor gear and clothing.

Challenges

The first challenge is reliable metrics for environmental impacts. From chemical use, to water and energy, to end-of-life impacts, it is difficult to quantify and qualify data and begin the process of sharing this information up and down the supply chain. Sourcing products and materials to meet our evolving ecoSensitive standards also presents a challenge. Lastly, communicating effectively with members and customers about the complexity of product impacts, while offering authentic information in an approachable non-expert manner while not inadvertently exaggerating claims is difficult.

Looking Forward

In 2008 we will define our ecoSensitive program based on the following standards:

• All ecoSensitive products will contain either 50 percent recycled or 85 percent rapidly renewable, minimally processed textiles or 95 percent organic cotton. A product can contain a combination of these three adding up to 95 percent of the product by weight.
• Any cotton used in our ecoSensitive products must be organic cotton.
• No ecoSensitive products can contain materials listed on the Restricted Substances List, which is a list of chemicals and materials we consider unsustainable.
• No polyvinyl chloride (PVC) can be used in our ecoSensitive products.

Our future goals also include assuring that all of our products meet our vendor fair labor program standards. We have begun to roll out this effort to ensure all of our vendors meet these standards by 2009.