In this series we talk to the individuals and companies helping retailers become greener businesses – highlighting the tools, technologies, and options available to support a change in environmental focus.
Green Retail World had a front row seat at Segura’s Retail Supply Chain Sustainability (RSCS) Conference earlier this year, and it is clear the company is becoming a key component in the sustainability journeys of retailers, brands, and their suppliers.
It continues to add fashion and apparel brands and retail groups to its growing stable of businesses which benefit from its supply chain mapping capabilities. Segura is surfacing the data that is becoming increasingly crucial to running a modern retailing business.
Segura became a Green Retail World partner in 2024, giving us a chance to catch up with the company’s business development director, Ed Austin, to get his views on fashion’s sustainability challenge, the progress being made, and Segura’s role in it all.
What is Segura and who are its partners?
Segura is a business dedicated to helping retailers and retail groups, including River Island, TFG Brands London, and Pentland Brands, deliver upstream supply chains that are better for people and planet.
Retailers using its platform can automatically discover and map their upstream supply chains and collect data on suppliers and products that is needed to meet growing legislation, manage compliance, and identify risk, while also underpinning decision making and aligning teams to their company-wide commitments. According to Austin, using Segura’s platform can also help drive operational improvements and free up sustainability teams to focus and really “move the dial” on sustainability and the wider ESG agenda.
“Retailers are all firefighting; they’re struggling – so they currently don’t have the luxury of time to make a difference on the things they want to make a difference on,” he explains.
Retailers are increasingly adept at addressing ethical and environmental impacts in their immediate operations, but the vast majority of their impact is found in the long tail supply chain.
“The bigger and more important task lies ahead in retailers upstream supply chains,” notes Austin, who warns imminent European Union (EU) legislation requires retailers to undertake due diligence and provide environmental and social data across their entire supply chains.
“It’s always the retail brand, its sales, and share price that will be damaged by poor ethical environmental practices. The need for upstream supply chain transparency inevitably falls at the retailer’s feet, so action must be taken now.”
Other retailers and brands in the Segura ecosystem, and which were in attendance at RSCS this year and in 2023, include footwear retailer Schuh and fashion brand Reiss. Womenswear brand Toast and Sweden-based New Wave Group, meanwhile, are the latest additions to the Segura portfolio.
Why now for supply chain mapping?
The raft of legislation coming through for fashion retailers is “forcing the issue” and making supply chain transparency and mapping crucial, Austin argues.
Segura and its clients have even created a legislation matrix for those in the fashion ecosystem, ensuring they have a resource for everything that is – or soon will be – expected of them as governments and industries ramp up regulations.
“You always have retailers who want to do the right thing and recognise current and future customers are concerned about the environment, sustainability, and ethics but the pending EU legislation has made retailers realise there is an enormous task ahead,” says Austin.
“Getting the information they need to meet legislation and align their own teams to make the right decisions to drive their sustainability agendas is an enormous task which will take time. Manually chasing and collating data using email and Excel spreadsheets is no longer viable or scalable. While having a platform like Segura will automate this and speed up the process, it will still take time.”
He emphasises now is the time for retailers to build supply chain transparency.
The finer detail around penalties for non-compliance is pending, but in September the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) issued new guidance aiming to help fashion businesses “stay on the right side of the law” and avoid greenwashing. As part of the statement, it revealed it has advised “17 well-known fashion brands” to review their sustainability claims.
It didn’t name them but the CMA’s warning indicates the sustainability scrutiny retailers are under.
“Retailers realise the size of the task and many are now starting to arm themselves with the relevant upstream supply chain transparency and traceability data,” Austin notes.
“You insure your warehouse before the fire starts, you don’t wait for the fire to break out. Lots of actions of their own have already been taken but now they realise the focus needs to be on their upstream chains as this is where the major change will happen.”
Sustainability runs deep
The retailers and brands taking sustainability and ESG most seriously have embedded it across departments, and elevated the agenda to the boardroom.
Austin says Segura engages with many areas of a retail business, reinforcing the mantra that “sustainability is a team effort and no longer a single department”.
“It goes across businesses and we’re seeing that in retailers’ annual reports,” he says, adding that Segura has worked with CEOs and CFOs who want to know where their risks are, and it has worked with CSR and sustainability teams who need the data to drive their strategy and individual commitments.
It doesn’t stop there. Segura’s capability is useful for sourcing and buying teams as it can help them access data they need to aid decision making.
“The decisions they make at the start will hit the shops a season or two later so it’s important to select ethical and sustainable suppliers and components right at the start,” Austin remarks.
“We also work with supply chain execs to help them identify cost saving opportunities in logistics. We work with compliance teams. All of these departments need the same data but for different objectives.”
Transparency is the “key starting point and underpins a sustainability strategy”, according to Austin, who says retailers armed with Segura-derived data have been able to join the dots across their organisation to make positive changes.
Segura customers have aligned manufacturing locations to reduce lead times, transport costs, and Scope 3 emissions. They have also been able to consolidate suppliers and leverage volume discounts with more sustainable suppliers to balance the costs, drive compliance, and remove materials where necessary.
“Sustainability often comes with a cost for businesses, but if you’re sensible about it you can balance that cost,” he continues.
“Indeed, although legislation is a key driver for supply chain transparency work, there is a growing realisation sustainability is not a cost centre but can in fact be a value centre.”
Progress
Sustainability can pay because there is a growing audience of consumers demanding it from the brands and retailers they shop with. But much of the supply chain work retailers are undertaking is actually bringing cost savings through increased efficiency.
Less waste, consolidated supplier bases, reduction in transportation; all of this helps the bottom line.
“That idea has taken time to emerge but the penny is dropping,” Austin comments.
He also acknowledges there are multiple players that need to come together to support the industry’s movement towards more circular and sustainable operations.
Segura has positioned itself as “the middleware” amid a myriad of tech solutions and data sources that retailers are using to drive their individual ESG agendas. For instance, it has a Digital Product Passport (DPP) module in its platform that means retailers can display the information required for this legislation at the point of purchase.
“Sustainability and ethical improvements require collaboration – it’s a team effort across retail, suppliers, and tech companies,” Austin says.
“Segura gathers what is needed to help drive positive change. There are lots of components playing a valuable part but they need to be pulled together – we are consolidating the data and serving it up to the people who need it.”
Overall, Austin is hopeful and encouraged by retail’s environmental awakening. In fact, Segura believes the data it surfaces can help retailers feel confident in talking about their environmental credentials without falling into the trap of greenwashing.
“With transparency and honesty, retailers and brands can talk about ESG and sustainability in the appropriate manner, and celebrate their successes with consumers,” he adds.
“There have always been retailers leading the agenda as they know it’s the right thing to do and that it’s an important buying decision of their consumers, but ESG and legislation such as ESPR [Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation] and DPP have elevated attitudes.
“Retailers realise it’s a one-way street now and they understand that sustainability and ethical trade is important to government, business, consumers, and investors, as well as the planet and people.”
At Green Retail World we are giving greener retail champions, like Ed and Segura, a chance to explain how they are helping retailers become greener businesses. Please contact editor, Ben Sillitoe, if you’d like to put yourself forward for an interview on this key subject. Sharing good practice can help the wider sector move in a positive direction.
[Image credits: Segura]
