Sustainability & Ethics

Yes. To further our commitment to ethical trade, we joined the ETI as a foundation stage member in September 2012, and as of February 2014, are now a full member. You can read more about our commitments here. We aim to integrate ethical trade into the heart of our business and believe working with ETI is essential to achieving this aim. To learn more about ETI and what it means to be a member, visit their website.

The White Company is committed to improving working standards in its supply chains through the application of international labor standards. This includes a commitment to improving standards in those parts of the supply chain that are the most difficult to reach.

Historically, the lack of visibility of home workers in supply chains, combined with their complicated employment status in many countries, has made them a vulnerable group. We take an open and positive position towards home working as one of the first steps in making progress on improving their labor conditions. To do so helps to prevent driving the practice 'underground', which can have unintended consequences, such as workers losing their sole means of income.

We understand it is a complex issue, but believe skilled home workers are important to the quality, handcrafted nature of many of our products. It is this belief that feeds our commitment to help them improve.

We carefully consider the materials we use across the business, only selecting the highest-quality fabrics and finishes. Alongside our skilled partners around the world, our London-based design team put concerted effort into sourcing new circular materials and responsible alternatives, while ensuring the quality and longevity of our product is never lost. We adhere to the highest standards and certifications to support this. We believe in timeless designs and carefully select natural materials, such as wood, wool, leather and linen, which become more beautiful with wear and use.

We partner with the best artisans and crafts people around the world, and endeavor to minimize our carbon footprint by ensuring our product is sourced from countries that specialize in the skills and techniques required to make it. 85% of our products come from five key countries: China, Portugal, the UK, Turkey and India. We also source from specialist artisan suppliers from Denmark, Spain and Vietnam.

It is important to us that we support specialist industries and the jobs they provide around the world. China has developed one of the leading global textile and hardgoods industries, boasting cotton, cashmere and silk renowned for their quality. We are proud to know where all our materials come from, as it plays a big part in ensuring the quality of product, but also helps us to manage and monitor our supply chains. As a result, we do not use cotton grown or processed in the XUAR. As ETI members, we also work in partnership with our peer brands and industry experts to identify and mitigate any potential risk to workers’ rights.

We hand-select our suppliers based on their specialist skill and craft, and are determined to ensure that when our product is made, great care and attention has been taken to better the livelihoods of the workers involved. We foster longstanding relationships – over 80% of our suppliers have been our partners for longer than 10 years. All our Tier 1 suppliers have third-party audits and we review them annually, sharing best practice where there is the opportunity.

Yes, we are proud to be the first British retailer certified by The Good Cashmere Standard® (GCS), which aims to improve the lives of goats and farmers, and the environment they live in. Since 2020, all our cashmere clothing and accessories are GCS-certified. We have full traceability of our cashmere and are continually working towards a fully transparent cashmere supply chain.

Most of our cotton is sourced from Egypt, India, Turkey and China, with smaller proportions from the USA, Pakistan, Brazil, Australia, Benin and Mali. Much of our cotton is organic, or recycled, and we also use Supima® cotton, known to be much stronger than conventional cotton. In Spring 2022, we will embark on a unique collaboration with the Cotton Connect REEL program to work alongside our Egyptian cotton farmers. This partnership is a first for Egypt and aims to train our cotton farmers on sustainable farming practices.

We do not test on animals and do not condone animal cruelty of any kind. We have banned the use of fur and rabbit. In addition, our bath and body products will all be vegan by the end of 2022. We use responsibly sourced feather and down, alongside fibers certified by the Responsible Wool Standard, The Good Cashmere Standard® and other ethical bodies, to ensure best practice is met and maintained for both the animals and farmers. All the leather, skins, down and feathers we use are by-products of the meat industry.

We are continually working and investing in sustainable packaging and have made several efforts to reduce our packaging output, from recyclable bags to using recycled content and investing in a new packaging machine in our Distribution Center. It remains a top priority for us and we are always striving to do more.

We strive to minimize our carbon footprint by ensuring our product is sourced from countries that specialize in the skills and techniques required to make it, and to deliver it to our customer with transportation methods that have the smallest possible impact on the environment. In line with UK government and international directives, we aim to achieve net zero carbon emissions by 2040.

Yes, all our card packaging and paper Is recyclable and FSC-certified. Our product-transit plastic bags are made from 30% recycled plastic.