Puma Plans Compostable Shoes with Cradle to Cradle Technology

"We are confident that in the near future we will be able to bring the first shoes, T-shirts and bags, that are either compostable or recyclable, to the market," Puma boss Franz Koch told the German business magazine Wirtschaftswoche.

He explained that the company was working with partners on developing products on the principle of the "cradle-to-cradle" design. "It follows two circuits, the technical and the biological: I can use old shoes to make new ones or something completely different, such as car tyres. In the biological cycle, I can make shoes and shirts that are compostable so I can shred them and bury them in the back garden. We are working on products that meet these two criteria."

Read more at The Guardian

Read more about Puma's sustainability at the Triple Pundit

Read more about Puma's intiatives

Puma Calculates Environmental Impacts... in Dollars

PUMA AG and parent company PPR HOME hired consulting firms PricewaterhouseCoopers and Trucost to calculate PUMA’s total global greenhouse gas emissions and total water use, respectively. As a global sporting goods and clothing company, PUMA AG sits atop an extensive network of suppliers, most of which operate outside PUMA’s direct control. The Environmental Profit and Loss study addressed everything from the extraction of raw materials to processing, manufacturing, and company logistics like design, warehousing, transportation and retail. The study did not address the environmental costs of waste and disposal....

PUMA AG’s Environmental Profit & Loss Account estimated the total economic value of PUMA’s carbon emissions and water use at €94.4 million ($136.95M) in 2010, with greenhouse gas emissions valued at €47 million ($68.18M) and water use at €47.4 million ($68.76M).

Read more at the NRDC's Smarter Business website

Find out about Trucost's methodology

Read PUMA AG’s press release