Leonisa’s Commitment to Sustainability Through Eco-Friendly Clothing

The sustainability discussion involving environmental, social, and governance issues is becoming more mainstream, especially among businesses. Around 2,000 companies worldwide, including a third of Europe's largest public companies, have set sustainability goals concerning these issues. And when it comes to sustainability, Leonisa is one clothing brand that comes to mind.

 

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Our clothing selection, which you can consider to go well with travel capsule wardrobes, includes undershirts for men and women, swimwear, bridal wear, women's shapewear, back support bras, and leggings. Even pregnant and nursing women can find comfort in Leonisa's clothing choices. Are you looking for the best bra for sagging breasts without wire? We strive to provide safe, high-quality nursing bras and other maternity undergarments while committing to sustainable manufacturing practices. What is Leonisa's eco-friendly clothing commitment? How does sustainability drive our commitment to innovation? Can our sustainability advocacy support self-expression among customers and employees? In this article, we discuss our sustainability practices and how they relate to the company's products. Furthermore, the article also explores the benefits of sustainability and eco-friendly practices to the company, its customers, and the community.

Our Commitment to Eco-Friendly Clothing

We believe sustainable production requires a mindful consideration of all aspects of the manufacturing process, from raw material to finished product. With this consideration in mind, we commit special attention to improving air quality, managing water consumption, reducing waste, and saving energy in every step of our clothing production process.

Energy Conservation

Our facilities use solar panels that can generate 700,000 kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electric energy from the sun per year. This energy generation allows us to reduce our carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions by 142 tons yearly, which would have required the effort of 520 mature trees to clean up. Furthermore, we are committed to sustaining efficient energy consumption by reducing our energy usage by 10% and maintaining this figure. This helps us reduce our costs so we can focus more on improving product quality.

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Water Management

Our treatment plant treats 100% of the water we use to produce our creations, allowing us to keep tight quality control on water processes, such as dyeing procedures. We reuse 20% of this water and discharge the rest through a sewage system to comply with strict environmental regulations. Our compliance helps reduce our impact on aquatic life. We also routinely check and perform maintenance on our dyeing machines to ensure optimal water usage to minimize or prevent wastage.

Air Quality Control

Reducing emissions is essential to maintain or improve air quality and help us breathe the air more easily. We use clean fuel for machinery maintenance to keep our atmospheric emissions 100% free of particulate matter. We also strive to keep volatile organic compounds away from our emissions to help maintain or improve air quality through state-of-the-art technology.

Environment-Friendly Materials Usage

We produce and utilize 100% compostable corn-based bags, allowing us to reduce or avoid relying on up to 50 tons of plastic bags yearly. We use small blister packs to protect our garments, cutting our plastic usage by up to 5.5 tons per year. We also use reusable hooks instead of plastic ones, saving us about 11 tons of plastic yearly. Additionally, our stores have mailboxes for collecting tags, which we recycle or reuse to help reduce our packaging costs as well as our environmental impact.

Materials Reuse and Conservation

At Leonisa, we believe there is power and value in reusing and conserving materials. We utilize scrap fabric to produce new products and reuse or sell waste fabric to reduce or prevent wastage. Our production facilities have also ditched single-use containers in favor of reusable ones. We use long-lasting plastic crates rather than cardboard boxes for storing and shipping our garments. 

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How Sustainability Drives Our Innovation

Leonisa strives to create clothing pieces that provide quality and durability through sustainable and high-tech processes. One way to ensure such production is through vertical integration. Being vertically integrated means, we have control throughout the entire process, from preparing raw materials to weaving, finishing, manufacturing, and distributing our products. We invest in cutting-edge technology for our equipment, such as dyeing machines, warping machines, looms, and cutters, to ensure efficient, cost-effective, and high-quality production. We also work with a partner company that converts plastic bottles into threads, which we use to create fabric for our garments. At least 5% of our portfolio now comprises eco-friendly products. Our goal is to increase this figure to 20% and implement biodegradation technology to help hasten the decomposition of our fabrics in landfills or oceans.

Our Responsibility to Employee and Community Development

At Leonisa, we recognize the talents of our employees and commit to their intellectual, social, and personal development. We have helped create 10,000 direct and indirect jobs and placed fourth in attracting and retaining talent within Colombia's clothing and leather goods sector. We also strive to provide a conducive workplace for our employees to encourage retention. On average, a Leonisa employee stays with us for 14 years. In partnership with the Urrea Arbelez Corporation, we have provided developmental opportunities in various communities in Colombia. These opportunities include technical and technological training for out-of-school youth and life skills development for kids, adolescents, and adults.

 Supporting Empowerment and Self-Expression

Leonisa supports empowerment and has helped women start their catalog sales businesses. Today, more than 353,000 individuals sell our clothing catalogs worldwide. We also provide opportunities for self-expression and encourage individuals to keep a healthy body balance. For instance, we remind women through social media and other channels to perform breast self-exams. We strive to spread empowerment and self-love through our branding campaigns and craft clothing products to reflect such messages. For example, our website features blog posts that promote building your own capsule wardrobe essentials so that you can pack and travel light while still expressing yourself confidently with your clothing choices. Do you want to learn about sustainability or how it can inspire you to put together your capsule wardrobe? Check out our blog posts to know how your clothing choices can empower you, or visit our online store at LeonisaUSA.com.

Reference

1. Sustainable Business Went Mainstream in 2021 https://hbr.org/2021/12/sustainable-business-went-mainstream-in-2021