Brands are giving themselves plenty of time to bring circular footwear programmes to market, but, for innovative companies in the shoe supply chain, work to develop the materials those programmes will need is already under way.

Recent messages from prominent brands about establishing circular footwear programmes are encouraging, even if the forward steps they have been able to take so far seem tentative. It probably makes sense for them to allow plenty of time to bring circular practices into their complex footwear production programmes and value chains.

In late September, Under Armour published a new sustainability and impact report, reflecting on its recent performance in sustainability and outlining targets for future progress. It said it would build sustainability and circular design principles into at least half of its products by 2027 but is giving itself until 2030 to develop chemistry and processes that can enable a circular footwear programme. By 2030, though, its intention is to bring circular footwear to market, at scale.

A few days earlier, adidas hosted a discussion at a design event in London to talk about its “progress in circularity”. A starting point for the brand was its Futurecraft footwear ideas, which it introduced in 2016 to demonstrate that shoes could be “made to be remade”. There have been further announcements, although these have focused more on apparel than on shoes.

Nevertheless, at the recent London event, its senior director for sustainability concepts in footwear and apparel, Paul Smith, said the brand remained committed to innovating and developing “product creation with circularity in mind, for apparel and footwear”. When he talked about taking innovation from idea to reality, he said the company wants to develop its own capabilities, but that it completely accepts that it needs to do this alongside partner organisations.

Material developers and other suppliers are working hard already to help footwear brands in all parts of the world bring to life the visions they have for shoes that will last a long time and, at the end of their useful life, can be re-engineered into new products and, finally, return to the earth to nourish rather than pollute the soil. If programmes are to come to market at scale by the end of the decade, work needs to take place now to ensure there are materials and components that will allow the brands to deliver what they have promised. These things take time.

On the road

Open cell foam technology developer OrthoLite has said that an initiative it has called Cirql is already helping to put the athletic footwear industry on the road to a circular, sustainable future. The company introduced Cirql in March, describing the technology as a new approach to sustainability in footwear, in materials and process. Powered by plants, Cirql can replace conventional foams with what the company calls “a true soil-to-soil solution”. It says Cirql is the first-ever EVA plastics-free, compostable foam solution that can either be made into nutrient-rich soil or depolymerised back into virgin chemistry. This provides an additional layer of flexibility for brands, helping them choose a path that fits their material objectives.

It has set up a whole new Cirql division of the business in the footwear manufacturing hub of Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam, under the leadership of company vice-president Matt Smith. Here, OrthoLite will make the product using a zero-waste process. At the time of the launch, OrthoLite founder and chief executive, Glenn Barrett, said: “Worldwide footwear production has increased by over 20% since 2010 with no sign of slowing down. As an industry, the onus is on us to help mitigate our environmental impact. It’s going to take commitment and a concerted team effort. Cirql is a major step in that positive direction.”

For his part, Matt Smith says the Cirql set-up in Vietnam represents an opportunity for footwear brands and their manufacturing partners “to move away from more hazardous materials and processes and into a new day in footwear manufacturing”.

In recent comments, OrthoLite has said that at the moment “even the most sincere sustainable efforts are often only treating the symptoms”, most typically through initiatives such as offsetting. In contrast, a truly circular approach addresses the root of the problem. It has repeated its conviction that Cirql can help the footwear industry “move in the right direction”.

Ingredients that never go away

To illustrate how much work goes into an initiative like Cirql, OrthoLite’s chief brand officer, Kristin Burrows, explains that the idea had been in development in-house since 2017. The company, which supplies materials to more than 400 global footwear brands and leading factories, was on a quest to help drive the global footwear industry to a more sustainable future through circular material innovation.

With over 25 years’ experience developing comfort and performance foam insoles that can be found in more than 500 million pairs of shoes a year, the OrthoLite and Cirql teams acknowledge the industry must work together to build a more sustainable direction in footwear. “The task has been to solve for a healthier process and then solve for a healthier product,” Ms Burrows says. It has what it calls a local-for-local sourcing strategy, producing its materials close to where footwear manufacturers have their factories. This has led it to establish production facilities in China, Indonesia and Brazil as well as Vietnam, while also working closely with innovators in the US.

This, in turn, has given it a network of experienced chemists, engineers and people with in-depth knowledge of the processes involved in turning 200-plus components into a comfortable, high-performance shoe. As more than four years of development of the idea before launch suggest, this does not mean that launching Cirql was easy. “Nothing worthwhile ever is,” Kristin Burrows says (attributing the maxim to her mother).

At the time of the launch, OrthoLite presented Cirql as a midsole foam, but it says the material has the adaptability to go into other shoe materials, too, including the insole components the company is perhaps best known for, as well as upper materials. In the first six months since the launch of Cirql, the company has focused on building awareness of the new foam technology, on introducing it to the trade and the industry, on giving brands time “to figure out how this will fit into their long-term material strategies,” the chief brand officer continues, “and into their marketing stories and brand positioning.” What will flow from this will be further close cooperation with these brands and with their tier-one factory partners “to ramp it up together” when the time is right.

Ms Burrows continues: “Brands are looking for solutions like this and it’s always our goal to answer the needs of our brand partners and work with them on delivering footwear solutions that help them reach their climate goals. We can't bring Cirql to market fast enough.” This is in spite of having seen no market data that indicates willingness on consumers’ part to pay more to have recyclable, biodegradable and compostable material in their shoes. Consumers want a sustainability story, she says, but do not want to compromise on price any more than they want to compromise on look or on performance. “Price is always an issue that we have to solve for,” she adds, “but the focus with our brand partners has been on building the circular product and processes that are better for the environment, and that part has been embraced.”

A good end of life

To tell Cirql’s circular story in the round, OrthoLite is convinced that it is also important to consider the recycling of shoes and footwear components. Part of this is designing into products a capacity for a good end-of-life solution. The good news is that the infrastructure already exists and is developing to manage consumer take-backs in the recycling and compostable space. Brands are participating in this new eco-system and anticipate forward momentum.

OrthoLite Cirql is an interesting contribution to the drive for circularity in the footwear industry. “We’re proactively exploring additional solutions for our brand partners that actively support the consumer take-back, disassembly and recycling process,” Ms Burrows says. “Our goal is to provide a 360-degree solution, from cradle to grave.” 

A machine for making Cirql foam materials for midsoles and other footwear components.

CREDIT: OrthoLite

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