Q&A with sustainability and affordable fashion expert Araceli Zorrilla-Quinza

Araceli Zorrilla-Quinza

Senior Sustainability Professional

Fusion Associates talks to Araceli Zorrilla-Quinza, senior sustainability professional with a background that spans working in fields as diverse as affordable fashion, luxury, NGOs and metals. Most recently she has been working on the sustainability agenda with ASOS and previously with Swarovski.

Q&A with Grishma Jashapara, Managing Partner at Fusion Associates.

Tell us a little about yourself and what you do.

An environmental engineer by training, I have been working on sustainability across different sectors, from public policy to metals manufacturing, jewellery, homewares and most recently apparel and beauty.

I currently work for a British online fashion and lifestyle retailer, leading the sustainable product team and our remit is rather vast; from assessing the impact of raw materials and define more responsible alternatives to working with teams across the business to organically integrate sustainability at the core of their strategies.

What is one of the most environmentally or socially positive project you have ever worked on?

I was invited alongside other sustainability colleagues at Swarovski, to support the Copenhagen Fashion Summit efforts to engage next generations in the efforts to build the foundations of a more responsible fashion industry.

I worked closely with a selected group of university students from different disciplines on a set of environmental and social principles that should drive the apparel strategies in the coming years. These principles, called the Youth Fashion Summit resolution, were presented to the UN as part of their ongoing work on a framework for sustainable fashion and accessories industry.

It was a very intense and rewarding exercise as it not only brought me closer to the thought process of our customers but I also worked alongside Greenpeace and Academia in the development of the principles, which in my opinion is the type of healthy discussions we as brands should keep having if we want to make real change in the industry.

In your experience of sustainability strategies, what is working and what isn’t?

In my experience, it is often the case that purpose seems to be decoupled from profit. In that context, it does help keeping it real. In a society driven by financial results, where jobs are always on the line, sustainability should aspire to be perceived as business critical, not an extra burden. And although it is sometimes difficult to quantify monetary benefits of sustainability, we should do our utmost to build robust business cases and learn from the experiences of peers and competitors – why are they successful or failed, would they work for our business model, for our target audience, for our supply chain?

We must also acknowledge and protect the key assets our success as a business and as a sustainability team depend on, be it a healthy supply chain, internal talent or an honest relationship with our customers.

In order to do so, sustainability must be placed at the core of the decision-making process, at the same level as other key horizontal functions such as Legal or Finance. Sustainability cannot be an add-on to adorn a project – it will not have a long-lasting impact and inconsistent one-off initiatives will be perceived as greenwashing.

Where have you seen major positive and negative changes with regard to fashion becoming more sustainable in the past 5 years?

This pandemic has obviously changed the landscape quite radically with fashion being one of the most negatively affected consumer goods sectors probably after tourism and travel. It has evidenced the fragility of a system based on tight and sometimes frantic schedules to ensure newness on inventories, complex supply chains and high consumer demand, so definitely more work needs to be done on that side to reset priorities and reevaluate the burden on our supply chains.

However, in my view, very positive steps had been taken in the past years to improve working conditions and transparency in the supply chain and well-known names in the industry have been leading the pack on collective initiatives to decrease environmental impact or promote circular business models, like ACT (Action Collaboration Transformation) or the Global Fashion Agenda commitments. We have seen an increase on management buy-in into sustainability strategies and allocated investment on new solutions and materials in many cases developed by start-ups and young entrepreneurs.

The surge of new independent brands with a sustainable ethos has also been very refreshing, especially as some offer great design at more affordable prices, which is still perceived as an obstacle for some customers to access more independent labels.

Overall, there have been many great initiatives but it sometimes felt like scattered efforts. It is now time to approach rewiring the fashion system in a more holistic manner.

If the premise of fast fashion is to encourage customers to buy more and often, can it ever truly be a sustainable model?

There is an obvious tension between the implications of being a sustainable brand and consumption. In my experience, an increasing number of brands are aware of that dichotomy and gradual adjustments to strategies are or will be developed to meet the existing (or potentially refocused) demand with a responsible offer.

Efforts are now focalised on making sustainable product choices available – that is, responsible and respectful social and environmental principles embedded throughout the full product cycle, from conception to end of life – that are also attractive and affordable for all customers.

Circularity is also an area with much potential, taking steps towards reducing dependency on primary raw materials and incorporating circular principles into product design and development, so less waste is also generated during the production process and resources are used more efficiently, with the potential of opening new revenue streams for suppliers willing to invest in new circular practices.

But indeed, going back to “business as usual” will not work as our “business as usual” has led us to where we are in the first place!

To address the challenges in affordable fashion, sourcing strategies with an approach tailored to suppliers, managing consumers’ expectations, overstock and social sustainability should become more prominent. This will have implications on pricing as high-street brands will need to maintain an affordable offer within the customer’s means while meeting their sustainability commitments. Consumers will have to help the industry redefine and align on a new normal for consumption if we never want to find ourselves in a similar scenario again by pushing the planet boundaries to a limit.

Is there a danger that sustainability initiatives and investment will take a back seat during and after Covid-19 due to economic hardship?

I believe they will inevitably do so in the short-term as the sector aims to stay afloat with the basics in place. In the mid-term, I strongly believe that the integration of sustainability in the business recovery process will be key to ensure not only the survival of a brand but also its adaptation to a post cov19 context. It could also be proof that sustainability experts (think of responsible sourcing and procurement, supply chain, ethical..) can and should be utilised in more ways than one as we do know about resilience, adaptability and creative solutions!

Will Covid-19 force companies to rethink their supply chains and if so what changes could help future-proof companies against other such global disruptive events?

Supply chains are critical assets that should be protected and nurtured, so I am hoping for a different type of dialogue between the various stakeholders in the chain, a more collaborative approach certainly when it comes to define priorities and ways of working that take into account the social, economic and environmental challenges in the supply chain and how to work together to overcome those.

We must ensure we bring the value chain along with us as our equals in the transition to a lower-carbon economy and a fairer greener industry that represents a win-win for all actors involved. Without a fair and true engagement no sustainability strategy can truly make a long lasting and commercially-sounded impact. Demand-driven sourcing strategies, localisation and accreditation/verification could also be a result from Cov19 with companies seeking to minimise the risk and establish long term relations with reliable and resilient partners.  

About Fusion Associates

Since 1998, Fusion Associates has been placing experienced professionals across the globe within consumer markets including consumer goods, fashion, sporting goods, healthy living and luxury.

Environmental, humanitarian, social and political concerns are close to the Partners both in and out of the business.

We pride ourselves in partnering with industry leaders who wish to contribute to a better, more sustainable future. Working with global companies that are at the forefront of innovating and integrating sustainability into the heart of their business, we have helped build purpose-led teams from leadership to subject experts in biodiversity and animal welfare.