NEW YORK, United States — In 2015, Nike set the ambitious goal of nearly doubling the size of its business in just five years. That's $50 billion in annual revenue by 2020, implying a compound annual growth rate of roughly 10 percent. That same year, the company also set a moonshot goal of halving the environmental impact of the products it sells by reducing waste, using renewable energy and shrinking its carbon emissions.
Today, to coincide with the start of Climate Week in New York City, the American sportswear giant is introducing its latest “super material” — Flyleather — engineered specifically with the company’s long-term business and sustainability Nike Internationalist Mujer goals in mind, and manufactured in partnership with Nike Air Vapormax Dame UK-based firm E-Leather.
The material is made with recycled leather fibres that are melded together with a polyester blend, allowing for more flexibility than traditional leather. Leather waste — scraps and the like — is crumbled into fibres, then formed into a paste with the power of water jets. That paste is then rolled into sheets of leather, and any scraps that remain after cutting are added back to the scrap heap, creating a closed-loop cycle.
Flyleather boasts a carbon footprint that's 80 percent smaller than traditional, full-grain leather and needs 90 percent less water to produce, according to Nike.
“If you look at our entire environmental footprint, 60 percent is linked to the materials that we use,” says Hannah Jones, Nike’s chief sustainability officer and VP of innovation. Leather, in particular, has “disproportionate” Asics Gel Quantum 360 Mujer environmental consequences, says Jones. While it is only Nike Air Huarache Womens Nike's tenth most-often-used material, it has the second-highest negative environmental impact.
But while Nike’s sustainability goals are a major talking point for the brand, the performance benefits of Flyleather were a driving factor in the development of the material. “Figuring out zero waste is critical, but at the end of the day, the question is: How can we obsolete the past?” says Jones. “We can never put something into the market that we think compromises performance or aesthetic or price, because we believe to do that is to do a disservice to sustainability.”
This goes some way towards explaining why leather has always been a “thorny issue,” as Jones says, for Nike. Many athletes — in particular, soccer players — are reluctant to abandon the material. Then there's Nike Cortez Womens aesthetics. “Whether it’s your handbag or a pair of brogues, Nike Air Max 90 Femme it wears nicely. It wears to you; it has a smell and a feel. It’s premium," says Tony Bignell, Nike's VP of footwear innovation.