The world’s renowned denim brand Levi’s has recently made great headlines. Its ‘Buy Better, Wear Longer’ campaign is back for its second year to raise awareness about overconsumption in the apparel industry. And this year, it’s focused on a brand commitment that sits at the foundation of buying better clothing: durability.
Global brands like Levi’s are the reasons why sustainability in the denim industry is a much-talked-about concept now. The interesting thing is that consumers are all up for a sustainable product and this is becoming a trend not just in overseas countries but in India also.
When it comes to faded blue jeans that are loved by everyone, the industry is gradually developing an understanding of the harmful environmental consequences involved in its manufacturing. It involves a huge usage of water, energy and intensive chemicals after which the desired finishing is obtained. And, the brands as well as fabric mills and garment makers are taking sustainable measures to save natural resources across their denim supply chain at the right time – if not late!
As far as Indian retailers’ and brands’ initiatives are concerned, right from bigwigs such as Reliance, Arvind, Raymond UCO, KKCL, Spykar to newly established home-grown brands such as 11.11, Doodlage, and The Summer House are taking onus on themselves to adopt ‘green’ concept through sustainable denim.
11.11 offers a denim collection of 100 per cent handwoven Kala cotton, which is organically grown without pesticides or toxins, while The Summer House’s denim garments are made from handwoven fabric recycled from garment waste and plastic bottles. Their denim is also pre-shrunk without the use of water in the process. Interestingly, The Summer House uses upcycled denim which is considered much more sustainable than a recycled piece!
“Very few companies are doing upcycling in India. And while looking at its potential, many more companies can do it. In future, the upcycled market size will be huge just like the responsible and sustainable fashion brands. Upcycling involves a new design process and may require a complete manufacturing cycle, just like it does for a new product. It can be time-consuming to source, disassemble and reassemble the product in the fast fashion industry,” told Shivangini Padhiyar, Founder and Creative Director – The Summer House.
Another home-grown brand Doodlage is known best for its upcycled and chic collections. The brand also offers a range of denimwear including jackets, tops, skirts, and pants made out of upcycled factory waste.
India’s top retailer Reliance also has a separate range of eco-friendly denims in which the fabrics used are made with significantly lesser water usage and chemical treatment.
Denim mills aren’t behind in their sustainable efforts too
Some of the Indian denim mills are globally known for their multi-directional efforts towards sustainability. KG Fabriks is one such mill and it will not be wrong to say that the company has left no stone unturned as far as sustainability is concerned. Be it use of solar power, collaboration with Ellen MacArthur Foundation’s ‘The Jeans Redesign’ project, water/energy conservation efforts and the use of recycled polyester.
Back in 2020, during pandemic time, the R&D team of KF Denim developed ‘Digital Denim’ which proved to be a breakthrough innovation to keep denim inventories lower and reduce overproduction!
“Just like apparel factories are creating ‘Digital Samples’ of their products, we came up with the same in denim fabric, 3D rendering of which is 99.99 per cent close to our physical samples. We understood that physical samples will not be in demand from now onwards due to a lot of cost and time-related reasons, so we formed a team of 10 people. Our R&D team worked hard to develop software in-house which cost around Rs.2 crore so that we are able to develop digital samples of our denim fabrics. All our customers are quite satisfied and are embracing the newly developed samples,” commented Srihari Balakrishnan, Managing Director, KG Fabriks Ltd. while talking to Team Apparel Resources (AR) some time ago.
Not just KG Fabriks, many more Indian denim mills are also concerned about the sustainable aspects in their products and their focus is on recycled denim and energy saving.
“Our R&D is continuing for recycled denim and very soon we will offer recycled denim. There is good demand for the same in the market, so we are focusing on it,” commented Gunjan Mittal, Director of Mehak Group, Ahmedabad.
Vinod Texworld, Ahmedabad is also banking on recycled denim yarns, while the focus is equally on generating renewable energy as it will also help the company to reduce costing. Harsh Mittal, Director of the company mentioned, “It is high time to expand by putting extra efforts in product development as well as sustainability that have to be the core aspects in all the developments going forward.”
Here is how garment makers are making denim apparel manufacturing more sustainable
First things first! The top garment manufacturing company in India, Shahi Exports, had set up the Denim Division in 2010 in Bengaluru. Currently, Shahi has two denim garmenting units and a laundry with a production capacity of 12 million pieces per year. Since then, this newest addition has led the growth towards sustainable operations internally and with the customers, as per the company.
Shahi has adopted Laundry 5.Zero strategy that has been predicted to revolutionise the denim industry. The company brings together cutting-edge technology from all over the world to make a truly global product, not just fashionable but sustainable.
“Judiciously utilising the four essential resources— chemicals, energy, water and our people define sustainability for us. Sustainable operations are not limited solely to environmental factors, but the well-being of our workers is equally important,” mentioned Nandheesh Gowda, General Manager, Laundry, Shahi Exports.
The design team at Shahi starts working from the initial stage – design to minimise the environmental impact of the production. It opts for lighter shades of denim which require a light wash and demand significantly shorter washing cycles, thus reducing the environmental impact.
Another leading jeans manufacturer, The Indaco Jeans Factory, Tarapur is on its toes towards reducing water usage, increasing usage of green chemicals, minimising carbon footprint, switching towards clean energy resources. Few of the initiatives of the company include its ETP plant, gas drier and energy-conserving line drying system to dry jeans using natural air. The thrust is also on technology as it uses the Environmental Impact Measurement software by Jeanologia and measures the water consumption, energy consumption, chemical usage and impact on workers’ health in the production process and how they affect its ecological footprint.
“We have invested in state-of-the-art technology and smart laundry systems having less consumption of water, energy and chemicals, advanced machines in departments like cutting and sewing to improve production efficiency and quality as well,” told Prasad Pabrekar, Founder of the company.
