To accelerate the shift to a circular economy, companies and other actors are encouraged to adopt various strategies and to take action. As a fashion entrepreneur you have the chance to make a difference and to affect the lifecycle of a garment. Such a product lifecycle consists of the following phases:
- Resources
- Design
- Production
- Retail
- Consumption
- End of life
For each phase, we have formulated five strategies that you can implement to contribute to a circular fashion industry. Seeing that it is impossible to apply all strategies to every part of the chain, this guide wants to encourage you to select a few strategies that are workable for you. After all, the success of a strategy depends on several factors (such as the size, focus and location of your business).
In addition, this tool offers quite a lot of practical tips and tricks that refer you to existing platforms, research that has already been done, as well as organizations that make an important contribution to the circular economy.
We will continue to expand the cases database by adding more and more inspirational examples for both entrepreneurs and consumers. The database now contains over 350 cases.
If you have a quick browse through this website, you’ll immediately notice the huge amount of information available. To make this mini-Wikipedia on sustainable fashion more manageable, Flanders DC launched the Close The Loop Planner in 2018. We walk you through all the phases with the help of a simple questionnaire, encouraging you to take a closer look at how every aspect of sustainability relates to your business. After you’ve completed all the questions, we identify your action points, providing you with a summary of both short-term and long-term goals, so you can immediately set to work.