The ocean is beautiful. Shouldn’t the people that make their living off it be more interested in keeping it that way? Photo: Warren Keelan
Surfing, a solitary and selfish act at times, would seem to have a small ecological footprint. A person can contribute to the destruction of the planet by littering, driving a gas guzzler, indiscriminately using one-time use plastics, and/or they can spend their life working for a bloodthirsty labor-exploitative corporate giant. But from the time that person hits the beach, paddles out, and catches a few waves, up until the time they head back to said gnarly job in their Hummer, he or she will have had little impact on the planet or society.
Although there are surely those who can compartmentalize, it is my experience that most surfers are socially conscious and environmentally aware whether in the water or out. The two seem to go hand and hand. The image of a surfer carries with it the image of a healthy person with a strong connection the ocean, as well as the natural world.
And these days the image of the surfer is not hard to sell. Companies like Vans, Quiksilver, DC, and Reef use the image of surfing as much as they use the actual surfing to sell products to people interested in getting in the water (or people who want others to think they are interested in getting in the water). As a side note, surfing is also fun and it looks radical! So, you can imagine, selling surf-style has all the ingredients of highly profitable business.
One would assume then, that the companies making bank on selling surf style would be interested in the health of the environment — the ocean being part of the environment and all. It is fairly sound logic that the health of any activewear/lifestyle brand, especially a surf-focused one, would rely heavily on peoples’ ability to get out into the environment and have an active lifestyle (i.e. go surfing).
Given this sound logical reasoning, we should conclude that surf brands would be the leaders in environmentally sustainable practices — it has to be this way. In a world of fast fashion, it must be those counter-culture warriors, the ones who shun industry standards, that do what’s right for the world. Right?
And that’s where this website goodguide presents a conundrum. Goodguide:
“… is in the business to provide authoritative information about the health, environmental and social performance of products and companies. Our mission is to help consumers make purchasing decisions that reflect their preferences and values.”
Goodguide rates apparel brands on a scale of 0 to 10 based on the following categories:
Environment: The impact of the company’s manufacturing and business processes on the ecosystem.
Society: The labor practices of the company
Here is a list of the scores received by some top surf brands:
Vans: 5.1
Reef: 5.0
DC: 3.8
Quiksilver: 3.1
A score of 5 or below means that at least 50% of apparel companies rated higher. In the case of Quiksilver, 50 of the 52 activewear brands listed on the good guide rated better.
The technology and research methods employed by goodguide are still in their infancy. You may notice that there are a lot of brands missing from this list. A search on goodguide turned up zero results for Hurley (owned by Nike), RVCA (owned by billabong), Billabong (owned by guys with some cash), and many others.
In any event, it is a perplexing state of affairs when surf apparel brands are disinterested in the health of the planet. Their entire pitch and messaging depends on the health of the ocean and potential people to surf in it.
No doubt there are likely many challenges an apparel brand faces in engaging in the best environmental practice, while making an appealing product at the same time. Even if we conclude it is in their best interest to be as environmentally conscious as possible, few of these companies portend to be.
But, what about the companies that do? There is one company that says explicitly, on their website:
” [We] employ what we believe to be environmentally conscious and socially responsible business practices. We may just be passing through, but we are not doing it without a conscience.”
This same company has an overall rating of 5.0 on goodguide and rates in the bottom 10 of 52 apparel brands. Further investigation reveals that this company’s low rating stems mostly from their resource use policy (how they handle the resources that go into the manufacturing of their products and how environmentally safe their resource use is), as well as the company’s transparency when it comes to sharing such information.
I asked Bill Pease, Good Guide’s chief scientist, for more information on how this company was rated. “ [This company] inherits the core company data used in its rating from its corporate parent company [VF-Corporation],” he said. Adding, “We have also done independent research on apparel category specific attributes for [this company] alone and integrated those into its rating.”
Maybe this company is just shooting too high by marketing itself in such a way. I asked Bill if he thought that a lifestyle/activewear brand in today’s marketplace of fast fashion could be relevant, profitable, and (at the same time) be a leader in socially conscious, environmentally responsible business practices.
“There are a variety of active wear brands that are global leaders in various aspects of sustainability, like Patagonia or Nike, but all of these companies have issues still to address in their supply chain,” he said.
For now Patagonia and Nike are the industry standard for apparel brands. But why not Quiksilver or Billabong? Why not RVCA or Vans? Or, why not that company that claims to not “Just be passing through”?
