Nike said it expects all its footwear to comply with its Considered design standards by 2011 with apparel meeting the standard by 2015 and equipment by 2020. Achieving these goals would reduce Nike’s supply chain waste by 17%, while increasing its use of environmentally preferred materials e by 20%. Currently, only 15% of Nike’s Spring ’09 footwear line is Considered Design.


The disclosure, made before the press at a high rise in New York’s financial district last week, marks the most public announcement yet of Nike’s sustainability goals. Since 1990, when Nike introduced its Reuse-A-Shoe footwear recycling program, the company has sought to achieve greater environmental friendliness in its products and processes.


“Natural resources are increasingly scarce, especially as populations continue to grow,” Nike president and CEO Mark Parker said. “But we are now seeing the emergence of a sustainable economy and with it the potential for Nike to be a game changer. Our goal is to reintroduce all waste into production. We want the product and production to be less reliant on oil. Sustainable design will improve gross margins, boost profitability, and it’s good for the environment and consumers.”
 
The long-term mission of Considered Design is to create products that are fully closed-loop. They would be produced using the fewest possible materials and designed for easy disassembly, which would allow the goods to be recycled into new products or safely returned to nature at the end of their lives.


According to Vogel, the four key areas of focus in Considered Design are waste, water, toxics and energy, since they have the largest environmental impacts. For this reason, Nike designers now use the Considered Index, a tool that measures the environmental impact of each product, and helps promote smart, sustainable design choices at the beginning of the creative process.


The Considered Index also pertains to packaging, and the company’s goal is to realize a 30% reduction in packaging waste by 2011-a move that has already saved the company more than $6 million. To underscore its commitment to sustainability, Vogel reports that Nike will “open the Index up next year to create a more universal tool that can be shared by others.”


Several Outdoor brands are now working to hammer out a similar “Eco Index” for the outdoor industry. The group, which includes employees of Polartec, The Timberland Co., and Mountain Hardwear, recently hired the Zero Waste Alliance to guide them through the painstaking process.