Sustainable Luxury, Beauty & Sport

Kinross Gold Corporation is pleased to announce the launch of their 2009 Corporate Responsibility Report http://www.reportalert.info/ra/profiles/Kinross/2010/?ID=32555.

The report chronicles Kinross’ progress over the past two years in delivering on the strong commitment to corporate responsibility that is expressed in the company’s core values and Ten Guiding Principles for Corporate Responsibility.

This is Kinross’ first web-based report and details the Company’s 2008 and 2009 performance in health and safety, environment, community and social development, engaging with local stakeholders, working with indigenous people, and more. The report also includes an overview of the Company’s new corporate responsibility strategy, and features a number of case studies. A PDF copy of the full report, detailed 2009 data tables, and other relevant documents are available for download from the homepage.

Explore the site at http://www.reportalert.info/ra/profiles/Kinross/2010/?ID=32555.

Kinross is a Canadian-based gold mining company with mines and projects in the United States, Canada, Brazil, Chile, Ecuador and Russia, and employs approximately 5,500 people worldwide. The company’s strategic focus is to maximize net asset value and cash flow per share through a four-point plan built on: delivering mine and financial performance; attracting and retaining the best people in the industry; achieving operating excellence through the “Kinross Way”; and delivering future value through profitable growth opportunities. Kinross maintains listings on the Toronto Stock Exchange (symbol:K) and the New York Stock Exchange (symbol:KGC).

Learn from GUCCI, JAEGER-LECOULTRE, ROSY BLUE DIAMONDS, WWF, UNCTAD, HEC Lausanne University and many more luxury brands, NGO and Corporate Responsibility experts. 

     Join the leaders of the Sustainable Luxury community for a one day highly interactive workshop on September 28, 2010 in Lausanne/Switzerland, to learn, share, network and experiment among CR peers, NGO, Academia and experts.  

DOWNLOAD THE EVENT BROCHURE

VISIT THE EVENT WEB SITE.   

Unique workshop. 

Early Bird price until August 25, 2010.  

 Be part of key discussion on Sustainable Luxury 2.0 by booking your place and join the leaders of the growing sustainable luxury community. The audience size will be limited.

Information and registration.

Fashion weeks are to the fashion industry what BaselWorld is for the watch industry: The event that will determine your benefits for the entire season. And we recently assisted to changes in the conception of the events. The Portland Fashion Week, which occurred last October, was especially based on sustainable fashion and green concerns.

First report: the logo! Yes, indeed, they mad it… green! The main idea of the event was to promote « eco-responsible fashion ». This is becoming a strong trend within fashion. It is mainly embodied by the idea of designing clothes and collections with natural products. According to Earth Pledge, a non-profit organization committed to support and promote sustainable practices in many areas (fashion, food, construction, waste management), 8′000 chemicals are used to turn raw materials into textiles. In the same way, 25% of the world’s pesticides are used to produce non-organic cotton.

Hence, awareness and responsibility have risen within the fashion industry. The Portland Fashion Week allows us to go further in our understanding of sustainability. This kind of event is important, as it is a very-well exposed scene to advocate change and action. But in order to declare itself a sustainable fashion brand, corporation should go deeper in their innovation strategies.

Let’s take an example of a well-know fashion brand: Hugo Boss. The German Company integrated sustainability and corporate responsibility in its corporate identity at several levels. They implemented a strict CSR strategy all along their production chain. Assessments are conducted both in the company itself and within their suppliers and producers. Goods can be tracked back through each step and location in the supply chain. Such transparency can be implemented within corporations. The NGO Respect Code advocates this kind of practice and helps you increase your responsibility.

However, sustainability should also be implemented with concerns for the environment. Hugo Boss AG holds its headquarters in building equipped with renewable energetic technologies (i.e. thermal lift and solar panels). They increased their logistic capacity in order to reduce waste of energies and ship merchandises by sea as often as possible, instead of by air. The company also campaigns for animal rights, especially against the practice of mulesing, performed on merino sheep. It only purchases wool material from farms that refute such practice.

What else?

Contact(at)wholebeauty.ch

Who has heard about the new HM2?

HM2 stands for Horological Machine n°2 and had been developed by Jean-Marc Wiederrecht for Maximilian Büsser and Friends . This masterpiece is surely one of a kind as being sold at the Only Watch Charity Auction. This yearly event took place last week in Monaco and seeks to collect funds for medical research against muscular dystrophy. And the HM2 was one of the 50 (fifty), yes fifty watches that were sold this day. The watch is amazingly gorgeous and it allowed to raise 80′000 dollars for medical research. Congratulations!

However, we are a bit doubtful about the real Return on Reputation (ROR) that such initiative generates among the various stakeholders, being clients, competitors, retailers, suppliers. We are not against such initiative, of course not, but dubious. We call it « Worthy Group Strategic Philanthropy ». We believe it’s unfortunate that no watch brand will really stand out from the other – as if they were controlling eachother ? – and we wonder if they should not start to embed seriously sustainability (or CSR) within their corporate strategy instead, to differentiate ? Sustainable Luxury goes far beyond Strategic Philanthropy. Living the philosophy of « Responsible Excellence® from Design to Waste Management » is what will differentiate watch brand in the future; or at least the one willing to be serious about sustainability.

By Christopher H. Cordey