Practitioner Papers

In the last decade, apparel companies mainly focused on achieving the best FOB (freight on board) price, the best quality, and the shortest lead time for their products in order to achieve commercial success. As a result they sourced globally to optimise their costs. However, there arose a growing awareness of different sourcing criteria in the textiles and apparel industry. For instance, human rights issues and environmental requirements emerged as crucial factors in the selection of business partners. Addressing consumer concerns has recently become a very important strategy for apparel companies. They are therefore more concerned about products sourced from the Third World whose manufacture violates human rights and causes environmental damage. As a result, ethical and green consumerism will become the trend in the future. An increasing number of people prefer to buy products and services from companies that are socially responsible, and they are willing to pay a premium for them. Concurrent with the changes in individual purchasing behaviour under the influence of ethical and green consumerism will be the increasing collective consumer pressure on producers of goods and services to produce ecologically friendly products using ecologically friendly materials and processes which do not violate human rights or use child labour. The increased awareness of these issues has forced apparel companies, especially those with brands, to develop specific guidelines or a code of conduct to ensure that their business partners comply with these newly established requirements. In the research under discussion, an industry survey was carried out to identify the essential criteria for selecting and evaluating business partners. Subsequently, evaluation models were derived for the selection of business partners. Feedback from the industry highlighted the fact that there is a need for a standardised, recognised evaluation method to be developed. If such a method were widely adopted, ethical standards would be raised and ultimately the quality of life of the communities in which garments are manufactured, sold and worn would be improved.