ESG HIGHLIGHTS FY 2023/2024
GENERAL DISCLOSURES
- We revised our ESG Due Diligence Framework to understand, manage, and mitigate our social and environmental risks.
- We advanced our materiality assessment in line with upcoming regulations and modified the methodology to double materiality.
Planet
- We are made progress toward achieving our science-based targets (SBTs) by 2025/2026 and reduced our Scope 1 & 2 GHG emissions by 73.8% (target: 80%).
- We increased the percentage of partners with SBTs to 72.7% (target: 90.0%) as well as our involvement in FASHION LEAP FOR CLIMATE.
- Our net revenue percentage from more sustainable products has remained stable at 24.6% although we increased the strictness of our product criteria.
People
- 49.7% of leadership positions and 30.4% of tech roles are held by women.
- We again achieved 100% private-label tier 1 factory supply chain transparency and increased tier 2 factory transparency to 96.5%.
- In net revenue terms, 64.6% of our third-party brand partners shared sustainability-related data with us.
CORPORATE CONDUCT
- Our Animal Welfare Policy forms the foundation for a compliance framework governing good animal welfare practices.
- By including internal guidelines we acknowledge our responsibility in building lasting business relationships.
OUR CURRENT ESG RATINGS
| Methodology | Rating | Evaluation |
|---|---|---|
| Morningstar’s Sustainalytics | 16.2 (Low Risk) | Our ESG risk rating ranks 3/96 in the Sustainalytics Online and Direct Marketing Retail sub-industry. |
| Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) ESG Corporate Rating | B- (Prime Status) | Our rating ranks in decile 1 (top 10%) of the retail industry (all information as of October 30, 2023). |
| Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) | A- | Based on our disclosure, we are among the top 8% assessed for supplier engagement on climate change and were therefore added to the 2023 CDP Supplier Engagement Leaderboard. |
GENERAL DISCLOSURES
OUR ESG DUE DILIGENCE FRAMEWORK
OUR APPROACH
We are fully aware of our responsibility for the fair and considerate treatment of everyone connected to our business – whether they are working for ABOUT YOU or our direct business partners in warehouses or call centers, or contributing to our value chain. To fulfill this responsibility, we established an ESG Due Diligence Framework with the aim of understanding, effectively managing, and mitigating our social and environmental risks.
OUR PROGRESS IN FY 2023/2024
We operated our ESG Due Diligence Framework in five stages:
- Continuously evaluating social and environmental risks via our ESG Risk Assessment and gradually improving our assessment as a basis for prioritization
- Deriving dedicated preventive and remedial measures across our organization and monitoring their effectiveness to reach specified outcomes, including engaging with our employees, direct business partners, and our value chain
- Setting up policies to formulate what we expect of stakeholders
- Providing access to whistleblowing channels
- Documenting everything we do and reporting our progress regularly
PLANET
SETTING SCIENCE-BASED TARGETS TO ALIGN WITH THE 1.5°C REDUCTION PATHWAY
OUR APPROACH
Our science-based targets (SBTs) were set in 2021 and approved by the Science-Based Targets initiative (SBTi) to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in line with the 1.5 °C pathway outlined in the Paris Agreement.
OUR PROGRESS IN FY 2023/2024
- We are committed to reducing our absolute Scope 1 and 2 GHG emissions by 80.0% by 2025/2026 from the 2019/2020 base year.
- We are committed to increasing our annual sourcing of renewable electricity from 32.7% in 2019/2020 (base year) to 100.0% by 2025/2026.
- We are committed to reducing our Scope 3 GHG emissions from private-label products by 35.3% per unit of value added from 2019/2020 (base year) to 2025/2026.
- We pledge that by 2025/2026, 90.0% of our business partners will have science-based targets (SBTs) for GHG emissions covering purchased goods and services, transportation, and distribution.
PROGRESSING TOWARDS MORE SUSTAINABLE THIRD-PARTY PRODUCTS
OUR APPROACH FOR THIRD-PARTY PRODUCTS
As an online fashion store, most of the products we sell are bought from third-party brand partners. Scaling the percentage of our more sustainable assortment and net revenue is a key component of our approach to reducing our resource consumption and environmental impact.
OUR PROGRESS IN FY 2023/2024
Percentage of more sustainable products in our core assortment [%]
| 2023/2024 | 2022/2023 | 2024/2025 target | |
|---|---|---|---|
| More sustainable products as a proportion of net revenue | 24.6% | 24.6% | 25.0% |
| More sustainable products as a proportion of the assortment | 16.3% | 15.5% | 20.0% |
In FY 2023/2024, we reviewed the criteria we apply for more sustainable products as part of our annual routine and redefined their eligibility for on-product communication.
PROGRESSING TOWARDS MORE SUSTAINABLE PRIVATE-LABEL PRODUCTS
OUR APPROACH FOR PRIVATE-LABEL PRODUCTS
Our Private Labels are EDITED, ABOUT YOU the label, and several celebrity coops. Where possible, we aim to replace the raw materials for these private-label products with more sustainable alternatives by 2025 and are engaging with suppliers to reduce the products’ environmental impact.
OUR PROGRESS IN FY 2023/2024
Ordered private-label products that met our more sustainable criteria for most commonly used materials [%]
| 2023 | 2022 | 2025/2026 target | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cotton products with organic or recycled cotton | 58.4% | 31.6% | 80.0% |
| Polyester products with recycled polyester | 55.7% | 29.4% | 90.0% |
| Viscose products with more sustainable viscose | 81.1% | 39.7% | 90.0% |
| Products supporting more responsible leather manufacturing (Leather Working Group, chrome-free) |
77.7% | 52.3% | 80.0% |
| NEW target: Wool products with more responsible or recycled wool | 42.4% | – | 75.0% |
In FY 2023/2024, we measured and analyzed the environmental performance of our tier 1 factories by using Higg FEM for a second time. Higg FEM provides factories with a clear picture of their environmental impact based on comparable data sets and helps them to identify and prioritize opportunities for impact reductions. Out of 121 active tier 1 factories in CY 2022, 63.6% (77) shared their Higg FEM 2022 responses with us, thus enabling us to assess their environmental performance.
ABOUT YOU joined the Leather Working Group (LWG) in 2020 to support more responsible leather manufacturing:
www.leatherworkinggroup.com
People
CREATING A FAIR AND FRIENDLY WORK ENVIRONMENT FOR ALL
OUR APPROACH
Employees are the core of our business. We see it as our responsibility to create a work environment in which our employees can thrive and leverage their potential. We firmly believe that workforce diversity makes a fundamental contribution to the ABOUT YOU culture.
OUR PROGRESS IN FY 2023/2024
Employees by gender and age
| 2023/2024 | 2022/2023 | |
|---|---|---|
| Employees | ||
| Number of employees | 1,400 | 1,521 |
| New hires | 461 | 692 |
| Gender representation | ||
| Women | 64.3% | 65.7% |
| Men | 35.6% | 34.2% |
| Non-binary | 0.1% | 0.1% |
| Women employees | ||
| Women in leadership positions | 49.7% | 51.1% |
| Women in tech roles | 30.4% | 30.3% |
| Age representation | ||
| Average age | 30.6 years | 29.7 years |
Improving private-label supply chain transparency and human rights due diligence
OUR APPROACH
ABOUT YOU relies on workers in upstream and downstream value chains. To manage and mitigate social risks, we implemented measures within the scope of our ESG Due Diligence Framework and developed a five-step approach when working with private-label suppliers:
- Utilizing our ESG Risk Assessment to continuously evaluate social risks and gradually improve our assessment as a basis for prioritization
- Deriving dedicated preventive and remedial measures and monitoring their effectiveness
- Setting up policies to formulate what we expect of stakeholders
- Ensuring the accessibility of whistleblowing channels
- Regularly reporting our progress
For our tier 1 factories we require third-party social assessments based on international human rights standards, such as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and ILO conventions. New factories must have a valid amfori BSCI audit or equivalent assessment prior to onboarding, and all current tier 1 factories must have passed an amfori BSCI audit by January 2025.
OUR PROGRESS IN FY 2023/2024
Our tier 1 transparency was once again 100%.
Our tier 2 transparency was 96.4%, up from 87.2% in the last reporting period.
ENGAGING WITH THIRD-PARTY BRAND AND LOGISTICS PARTNERS
OUR APPROACH
As an online fashion store, we aim to increase transparency and reduce our sourcing risk at a structural level through appropriate policies, engage with our brand partners to manage social risks, and work toward a uniform approach for the textile industry. We therefore collaborate with brand partners by conducting a sustainability performance assessment for brands and retailers (Higg BRM).
OUR PROGRESS IN FY 2023/2024
Higg BRM engagement with third-party brand partners [%]
| 2023/2024 | 2022/2023 | |
|---|---|---|
| Higg BRM data shared with us in terms of previous year’s net revenue share | 64.3% | 66.6% |
| Verified Higg BRM data shared with us by the same metric | 22.5% | 38.5% |
After completing an accumulated data analysis of the shared Higg BRMs in the past two years, we reviewed the data at the brand partner level in the year under review. As Higg BRM went through a major restructuring exercise in this past year, which impacted our KPIs, we cannot compare their performance with previous years and thus created a new baseline to serve from FY 2023/2024 onwards
ENABLING CUSTOMERS TO MAKE MORE SUSTAINABLE CHOICES THROUGH SUSTAINABILITY LABELING
OUR APPROACH
As more and more of our customers are now environmentally conscious and ethically minded, they are demanding a higher degree of transparency and sustainability in their products. As there is no industry-wide definition of what constitutes a more sustainable product, we are determined to be as transparent as possible by offering more sustainable product labels and enabling consumers to make informed purchasing decisions through factual information based on environmental and social criteria.
OUR PROGRESS IN FY 2023/2024
In FY 2023/2024, we reviewed the criteria we apply for more sustainable products as part of our annual routine.
Our intention was twofold:
- Alignment of our criteria definitions
with new market and regulatory developments - Incorporation of newly relevant criteria since the last update
As a result of our annual evaluation the previous year, by the end of February 2023 and with effect from early March 2023, we had removed certain more sustainable product criteria from on-product communication
Corporate Conduct
PARTNERSHIPS WITH SUPPLIERS
OUR APPROACH
We operate our online fashion store with the support of multiple business partners, including third-party brands, private-label suppliers, logistics, and customer service providers, as well as marketing and digital content creation partners. As these partnerships are essential to us, we acknowledge our responsibility in building lasting business relationships.
OUR PROGRESS IN FY 2023/2024
Two partnerships were of particular importance in the year under review:
- We collaborated with Cascale brands and retailers in the Decarbonization Strategic Council and a brand engagement working group.
- Together with YOOX NET-A-PORTER and Zalando, we continued working on expanding the impact and reach of FASHION LEAP FOR CLIMATE, an initiative led by the fashion industry that drives climate education and partner engagement, taking action to reduce GHG emissions in fashion value chains and across the fashion industry as a whole.
We believe that involving our direct business partners can multiply our positive impact beyond our direct operations. We are open to and actively looking into further partnerships and collaboration opportunities.
