Orba making shoes out of plants
Start-up company Orba based on the Kāpiti Coast have developed a world-first: a street sneaker designed to biodegrade. Orba shoes are designed in New Zealand and almost every part of the shoe is made from plant-based or biodegradable ingredients, ethically sourced from around the world.
Start-up company Orba based on the Kāpiti Coast have developed a world-first: a street sneaker designed to biodegrade. Orba shoes are designed in New Zealand and almost every part of the shoe is made from plant-based or biodegradable ingredients, ethically sourced from around the world.
Co-founder and Sustainability Manager Gillian Boucher who has an MSc in Sustainable Development, shares her insights on how they operate as a sustainable business.
“Our first step was to look at our business activities and identify impacts. As a footwear manufacturer dealing with many different materials, components, and supply chain levels, it’s quite complex. We look at the environmental and social impacts of the materials we use, from resource extraction to processing and manufacturing, to end-of-life. We look at the impacts from our supply chain from our manufacturing processes through rigorous sustainable supply chain management.”
Orba became a Certified B Corporation in 2021 just three months after launching the Orba “Ghost” shoe. This involved a robust impact assessment and auditing process, requiring extensive evidence and documentation supporting the business approach, activities and claims.
“The most challenging aspect of incorporating more sustainable ways of operating was with suppliers who were not part of the sustainable fashion movement. Because our basic criteria for materials is plant-based and biodegradable, we need to know exactly what components and materials are made from and their processes of production. Some suppliers pushed back at this need for transparency and deemed it as suspicious as they were not used to customers looking for such detail. A lot of components of footwear are produced in low-cost-countries so finding suppliers that met the criteria established in our Supplier Code of Conduct was challenging.
Materials supplied by eco-certified suppliers are more expensive, so we needed to find a balance between sustainable suppliers and the economic constraints of a start-up business.”
Orba’s sustainability initiatives include procedures that not only minimise the negative impacts that the business has, but also looks to create positive impacts within an environmental, social and economic context. Gillian outlines the benefits for a business of undertaking sustainable practices.
“Sustainability helps businesses give consumers what they want. Consumers value transparency in the supply chain. In the fashion industry, ‘who makes your products’ is the question most conscious consumers are asking. By choosing third-party verified materials and suppliers such as Global Organic Textile Standard (GOTS) and Fair Trade, we know that right down to the cultivation of raw materials the workers along our chain meet best practice standards of labour rights and that our materials are non-toxic and eco-certified.”
“Sustainability helps us secure investment. ‘Impact Investment’ funds are also growing whereby investors want to invest their dollars in companies that are taking responsibility for the impacts of their activities and are giving back to the communities they work in.”
“Sustainability also gives us access to a global network of like-minded businesses and ‘businesses for good’ like to help and work with each other. Becoming a Certified B Corporation has opened the door to incredible networking and collaboration opportunities with like-minded brands in Aotearoa, and as we move into international markets. We know that the B Corporation logo is identified globally as the gold standard for sustainable business practices.”
“Sustainability is an investment but one with returns, and market research shows that consumers are willing to pay a premium for more sustainable products.”
Since launching, Orba have captured both international and national acclaim and have won several awards in the sustainability space. Their Ghost sneaker took out the Sustainability category at the Global Footwear Awards in 2021 and the Sustainable Product Design category at the Design Institute of NZ in the same year. These awards endorse the unique world-first approach to design and sustainability that Orba delivers.
Orba shoes are made from nature and designed to biodegrade, to find out more about the work they do visit https://orbashoes.eco/
Read full Q & A [PDF 98 KB] with Co-founder and Sustainability Manager at Orba, Gillian Boucher