We invite everyone to familiarize yourself with the another case study created within the Circular Public Procurement.

Better World Fashion manufactures leather goods such as jackets, bags, oven mittens, computer bags etc. based on recycled leather. All their leather jackets include a buy-back guarantee when purchased. Additionally, they have short-term rental (4 months) and leasing model (24 months) for their jackets.

Circularity of business model:

Better World Fashion is able to reduce the need to harvest new leather by relying almost entirely on pre-owned or recycled leather to produce a broad range of leather-based products. Furthermore, they promote reusing leather by keeping ownership of their jackets through their rental and leasing systems, which allows them to retain their products at the maximum potential value in the economy. In addition, the buy-back guarantee that all of their jackets include, incentivizes customers to return their products once they are no longer considered useful for them. This allows Better World Fashion to re-use the leather in other products.

Other benefits:

Their business model provides benefits to multiple stakeholders. Firstly, they help satisfy the demand for leather jackets without increasing demand of virgin materials that in itself, brings about an environmental benefit. For their environmentally conscious customers, they are able to access leather jackets that have a significantly lower environmental impact. Additionally, their financial models allow new customers to try a luxurious article such as a leather jacket without the large financial investment required.

Furthermore, they provide an income stream for NGOs that are focused on collecting used garments, similarly to users with un-used leather products at home.

Main Barriers:

The main barriers or disadvantages that Better World Fashion faces is difficulty in competing with the price level that their competitors are able to offer. They understand the traditional modus operandi of the fashion industry is based on environmental and social exploitation that allows bringing down prices. Therefore, the decision to improve their production processes in terms of environmental and social protection makes them more expensive to produce.