How Sneaker Brands Are Becoming More Sustainable

Jul 11, 2023

How innovative brands are making footwear that treads more lightly on the planet.

Think about all the shoes you’ve ever owned and discarded. Chances are many of them are still sitting in a landfill. There is no denying the impacts of the fashion industry on the planet; the amount of greenhouse gasses emitted to produce goods to meet consumer demand is estimated to be the equivalent of the economies of France, Germany, and the UK combined. The industry also happens to be the second-largest consumer of the world's water supply, among a myriad of other environmental impacts.

The foremost problem with footwear lies in what shoes are made of and what happens when we’re done with them. More than half of the materials used to make the majority of footwear are synthetics made from plastics. Those plastics come from oil–the fossil fuels that are impacting the planet–and accelerating climate change. Because their components are molded, stitched, and glued, recycling shoes is next to impossible, so they inevitably end up in landfills. In the U.S. alone, it is estimated that Americans throw away at least300 million pairs each year.

But it's not just materials that make the footwear industry unsustainable; we’re consuming way too much. If you think about the last pair of shoes you bought, would you say you really needed them or did you just want them? In 2018, each person in North America bought an average of 5.6 pairs. The industry and its clever marketing have perpetuated the idea of continuous consumption. As a result, over 20 billion pairs of shoes were produced worldwide in 2021. Consumers have amassed sizable shoe collections with an equally sizable carbon footprint attached.

It's time to rethink how our shoes are made. It's time for brands to start innovating their way out of a dependency on plastics and transition to renewable, natural, and recyclable materials with a smaller carbon footprint. It's time to empower consumers to buy consciously and maximize the life of their shoes. Below, we take a look at some of the brands whose unique innovations make footwear that treads more lightly on the planet.

Bamboo, cork, sugarcane, eucalyptus, algae… the list goes on, demonstrating just how much Mother Nature has to offer us. Native—known for their slip-on perforated plastic shoe—is innovating with an algae-blended material (called ‘'Bloom' technology), engineered to replace a percentage of the plastic polymer typically used to make the ethylene-vinyl acetate (EVA) shoes. Algae threaten to overtake many waterways. Native transforms the undesirable excess into an environmentally sound product while restoring freshwater back to the environment. Their limited edition Plant Shoe combines cotton, linen, and kenaf plant fiber with a pretty surprising material: pineapple. Sourced in the Philippines, pineapple leaf fiber—an agricultural waste product—is saved from being discarded and used to make the shoe's upper component.

Allbirds, a brand long-known for innovating with naturally-derived materials, taps into the potential of trees using responsibly sourced TENCEL Lyocell eucalyptus tree fiber from FSC Certified forests. This material is cultivated solely with natural rainfall and eliminates the need for irrigation and fertilizers. Compared to traditional materials, TENCEL Lyocell uses 95 percent less water than conventional cotton and has a carbon footprint that is one-third lower than virgin nylon. Austria-based Giesswein is another brand that leans into the sustainability superpowers of eucalyptus fiber to create their low carbon footprint Wood Sneaker.

A highly renewable plant with remarkable CO2 absorption is bamboo, a material that Brazilian sneaker brand Cariuma blends with recycled polyethylene terephthalate (PET) to craft their bamboo knit IBI Low. When bamboo is cut from the stalk, it's capable of regenerating just like grass. This protects the integrity of the plant and soil, allowing Cariuma to sustainably extract and form a fiber-rich pulp. The bamboo they use is certified by the FSC, OEKO-TEX, and the Organic Crop Improvement Association.

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Many brands are touting vegan leather as a more planet-positive material due to perceptions of leather's negative impact on animal welfare and the environment. Unfortunately, most leather alternatives are made using plastic. Many brands are starting to experiment with bio-based materials, with the goal of mimicking the look and feel of leather with less impact.

Allbirds has taken aim at fashion's pleather problem with 100 percent plastic-free plant leather. Made with MIRUM, the leather alternative used in their Plant Pacer, contains only natural materials like rubber, plant oils, and agricultural byproducts like rice hulls and citrus peels. As a result, the plant leather produces 88 percent less carbon than traditional bovine leathers and 75 percent less carbon than other alternatives on the market.

Food byproducts are also being upcycled into leather-like materials. Italian sneaker brand P448 introduced their Vegan Apple sneaker made from apple cores and peels diverted from the food waste supply chain that would otherwise be discarded. The AppleSkin material combines apple waste with polyurethane, for a partly bio-based leather alternative that reduces the amount of fossil fuels and synthetic material required while putting byproducts to good use. Similarly, Barcelona-based brand Saye has created styles made from organic cactus leaves and mango waste. The process of crafting with cactus involves simply harvesting mature leaves without damaging the rest of the plant, then drying the leaves under the sun without any additional energy use (while also absorbing carbon dioxide). The result is a leather-like material that performs exceptionally well, eliminates the need for toxic chemicals, and is partially biodegradable. The new Yatay 1B sustainable sneaker from luxury Italian brand Golden Goose—its name symbolizing the principle of circularity—uses a bio-based material derived from vegetable sources not in competition with the food chain. Said material is said to reduce emissions by 90 percent and water usage by 65 percent compared to leather. Meanwhile, Thousand Fell'ssneakers deliver a leather-like look and feel using corn waste, coconut husk, and recycled bottles.

Leather alternatives are also cropping up from some pretty unlikely sources. P448 is innovating with some unique applications, and helping to save coral reefs from invasive species in the process. Lionfish populations continue to expand, causing the extinction of native plants and animals in coral reefs, which damages critical ocean biodiversity and habitats. The brand's Lionfish Collection features heel tabs crafted from lionfish leather, supporting environmental efforts to remove predatory, invasive species from coral reefs and help heal and maintain ocean biodiversity.

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Imagine being able to read the carbon emissions created by your footwear like calories on food products. Well, Allbirds made it a reality by labeling 100 percent of their products with carbon footprints. They tell consumers exactly how many kilograms of carbon are emitted in the production of each pair.

The brand believes they owe its consumers nothing, and by that they mean no carbon. In June 2023, the brand is gearing up to reveal M0.0NSHOT, the world's first net zero carbon shoe. Compared to the industry average of 14 kg of CO2e, this shoe's 0.0 kg CO2e carbon footprint was achieved without relying on a single carbon offset. The shoe is designed using materials like merino wool from a regenerative farm in New Zealand that sequesters more carbon than it emits, and their trademark SweetFoam, a carbon-negative, sugarcane-based foam.

A post shared by Allbirds (@allbirds)

Whether it's intercepting ocean-bound plastic or breathing new life into scraps leftover from the manufacturing process, we’re hearing a lot about recycled materials in the footwear industry. Adidas teamed up with Parley for the Oceans to create their Primeblue collection. Using plastic waste retrieved from beaches and coastal communities, they spin the material into a high-performance yarn. This process allows them to decrease the use of virgin polyester by more than half, according to the brand.

According to a World Wildlife Fund report, leather has a role to play. Rising beef consumption globally means hides will continue to exist in the market and if they are not used for leather they often go to waste, creating additional greenhouse gasses by sitting in a landfill. "The leather industry's use of hides from animals that were already going to be slaughtered is better for the environment and the economy than simply discarding them," says the WWF. The report goes on to highlight leather's recyclability and reusability, versus many leather alternatives made of plastic that typically don't last as long and are less likely to be recyclable.

Traditional leather tanning processes use harsh chemicals that stay in the environment and have the potential to pollute waterways if not properly disposed of. Today, alternative tanning processes to reduce and eliminate the use of such chemicals are being used. The bovine leather used in select VEJA styles is tanned in Brazil without the use of any hazardous chemicals, and with special attention paid to water usage. The tanneries supplying VEJA's leather products are Gold certified by the Leather Working Group, an organization focused on sustainable practices to reduce the environmental impact of the leather. Similarly, Cariuma sources its leather and suede materials from Gold-certified suppliers who observe the highest standards of environmental and social responsibility. Furthermore, none of Cariuma's materials are sourced from areas deforested for cattle-farming purposes, and 100 percent of the water used in the tanning process is recycled and reused.

To ensure their sneakers don't contain any toxic or polluting chemicals, VEJA tests for chemical safety and has established a policy on chemical transparency. In 2010, testing revealed a questionable chemical product used in the dying process of one of their styles. They eliminated it right away. Today, over 173 materials from their entire collection get tested every year, as part of their ‘Restricted Substances Policy’, and their material suppliers must submit a test report specifying that their products do not contain the most commonly used hazardous chemicals in the fashion industry.

A post shared by VEJA (@veja)

Cobblers are making a comeback in an effort to keep shoes in use longer. VEJA, who believes the most ecological shoes are the ones you already wear, wants to help consumers maximize the life of their shoes. As part of their ‘Clean, Repair, Collect’ project, they opened brick-and-mortar cobbler locations with the intent of cleaning and fixing shoes. When they’re no longer fixable, they are collected for recycling. The first cobbler opened in Bordeaux in 2020, followed by locations in Paris and Berlin, with thousands of pairs refurbished to date. With a similar goal in mind, Golden Goose has opened the doors to what they refer to as the ‘Forward Store’, with locations in Milan, Dubai, and New York to date. Conceptualized with the ambition of lengthening the product's life cycle, shoes can be given new life through repairing, remaking, reselling, and recycling.

Recycling programs are becoming more commonplace, such as Nike's drop-off initiative for retired products. This allows consumers to bring in their used athletic shoes and apparel to participating Nike stores where they will either be cleaned and donated, or sent away for recycling. Since 2018, Native's Remix Project has recycled enough shoes to create a bouncy base for five playgrounds throughout Vancouver.

Closed-loop footwear brand Thousand Fell creates full-circle footwear designed to never go to a landfill. Their recycling program ‘Trade in by TF’ pays consumers to participate in the circular economy by recycling their clothing and footwear, and earning credits towards future purchases. At their recycling facility, sneakers will be pulled apart to separate the materials for recycling or composting. Recycled materials are then reintegrated into their supply chain or upcycled into new supply chains. If the sneakers returned to them are still in good shape, the brand works with Soles4Souls to give the sneakers a second life to someone in need.

A post shared by Thousand Fell (@thousand_fell)

With the ethos that more can be achieved through collaboration than competition, Allbirds took out a full-page ad in the New York Times for Earth Day 2021, effectively giving the competition their ‘secret recipe’ for carbon footprint success. The spreadsheet they use to calculate carbon emissions was made available to the fashion industry free for the taking via a QR code. They plan to do it again, open-sourcing the toolkit that got them to their zero-carbon shoe, and inviting the industry to follow in their footsteps.

With rampant greenwashing claims, it's important that brands not only set concrete sustainability goals, but that they commit to delivering while being transparent about their progress. Allbirds, as part of their sustainability ‘Flight Plan,’ has committed to cutting their carbon footprint in half by 2025, then reducing it to near zero by 2030. One year in, and they’re already nearly a quarter of the way to reaching their goal. Ambitious goals set by Golden Goose to meet by 2025 include launching their first circular design, ensuring new products are safe, circular, and responsibly made through Cradle to Cradle certification, and becoming carbon neutral at sites worldwide. As outlined in their Corporate Responsibility and Sustainability Report, Deckers Brands has pledged that by 2027, 55 percent of all co-polyester fibers and films in HOKA footwear will originate from post-consumer, post-industrial, or renewable resources. By the end of FY22, they are on track at 21 percent.

We’re starting to see brands eliminate excess waste by ditching the double box, and shipping shoes in the shoebox itself. Cariuma uses 100 percent FSC-certified recycled and recyclable paper to cushion kicks, and colors their packaging with soy-based ink that doesn't compromise the recyclability of the packaging materials. Carbon-neutral shipping is becoming commonplace, and because of the reduced space and weight required to transport the forthcoming M0.0NSHOT shoe, Allbirds’ packaging is carbon-efficient. The transportation is carbon-conscious, using biofuel-powered ocean shipping and electric trucking. By 2025, the brand aims to achieve a steady state of over 95 percent ocean shipping.

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