Sustainability
Fair Wear Foundation & Picture
The lack of consideration for workers is a well-known fact in the garment industry. Deplorable working conditions are a reality in many factories.
Since 2008, we have always placed our commitment to labor and social change at the same level as our commitment to the environment. Behind every Picture product manufactured with environmentally-friendly materials, there are men and women who work hard to make these products as high-quality and long-lasting as possible.
Since 2016, we have been a member of the Fair Wear Foundation as part of an overall effort to continuously improve workplace conditions for the people who make our products.
What is the Fair Wear Foundation?
The Fair Wear Foundation is an organization that works with brands, factories, unions, non-profits, and sometimes even governments, to improve workplace conditions for employees in the garment industry.
FWF bases its work on 4 main principles:
• Ensure respect for human rights within the supply chains of member brands,
• Ensure good workplace conditions in garment factories,
• Provide an employee complaint helpline in 11 different countries,
• Encourage cooperation between factories, brands, and other stakeholders.
Complying with the 8 pillars of the Fair Wear Foundation’s labor standards is the underpinning of our partnership with the foundation and every factory.
Every year, FWF conducts an audit on our purchasing practices, our relationships with factories, and on our ability to implement initiatives that benefit workers. Being part of FWF’s continuous improvement process requires thorough knowledge of how every factory works, of potential subcontractors, and how to conduct audits to ensure compliance with the foundation’s labor standards.
In 2019, 100% of the factories we work with participate in FWF’s program to improve labor conditions in the garment industry, and 84% of our production volume currently goes through audits. We are striving for 100% between now and 2022.
Our production model rests on the principal of limiting workplace risk as much as possible by only working with a small number of factories. Specifically, 84% percent of our production volume is manufactured in just 2 factories that we have been working with since Picture was founded in 2008.
– Li Lian, a factory in Dongguan, China, for our technical products.
– Seyfeli, a factory in Izmir, Turkey, for our lifestyle products.
These long-term partnerships are critical in our effort to implement labor initiatives for factory workers.
However, it is not enough to focus only on the people who work on the final phase of manufacturing a garment. We are interested in the entire process, from the raw materials to the finished product. This provides us with an understanding and an expertise for the entire supply chain, from the cotton farm to the plastic bottle recycler, by way of the fabric weaver.
In 2017, we were in Turkey to view the entire organic cotton t-shirt creation process first hand. We made a video and wrote an article that you can see here.
In 2018, we went to Taiwan and China to retrace the ski jacket manufacturing process starting with plastic bottle recycling. View the summary here!
Finally, we also participate in the I Made Your Clothes movement launched by Fashion Revolution. Follow this link to learn more.
