How To Make Sustainable Shoes In 5 Simple Steps
The social and environmental impact of the fashion industry is mainly focused on clothing but what about footwear?
We take a look at how to make sustainable shoes to find out why some brands are still digging their heels in about materials, post-consumer waste, and ethical manufacturing.
What Are Sustainable Shoes?
The Footwear Distributors and Retailers of America (FDRA) is a shoe business and trade association representing 95% of the footwear industry.
The organization defines sustainable shoes by their: “shoe design, development, manufacturing, distribution, and selling processes that minimize negative environmental impacts, conserve energy and natural resources, are safe for employees, communities and consumers, and are economically sound.”
While FDRA’s sustainability progress report found that 79% of footwear professionals felt they improved in 2023, the footwear industry still has some steps to take. Over 20 billion shoes are manufactured around the world, contributing to 1.4% of global greenhouse emissions.
Large footwear brands like Nike have been under fire for using sweatshops to make their sneakers and athletics gear since the 1970s. In 2023, the brand was hit with a class action lawsuit over greenwashing claims.
Sustainability is a work in progress and we don’t expect brands to be perfect, but in an ideal world, every part of the shoe’s lifecycle from source to end should be accounted for. This includes production, materials, supply chain, carbon footprint, longevity, and circularity.
With steps being taken (forward and back) in the name of sustainability in footwear, let’s take a closer look at how to make a shoe sustainable.
5 Tips On How To Make Shoes Sustainable
1. Use Sustainable Materials
If you’ve ever looked closely at a pair of shoes, you probably know that a LOT of different materials are used—often in the same shoe. Because there are so many different components in footwear—uppers, insoles, outsoles, midsoles, laces, and more—there are a lot of different materials to consider depending on performance needs.
Generally speaking,sustainable materials in shoes include natural and biodegradable fibers from plants or some animal-derived products like wool. They are renewable which means they can be replenished naturally without the need for petroleum-based production and they can biodegrade, leaving no trace behind.
While leather, one of the most common materials in footwear, can technically be biodegradable as it’s animal-derived, the conventional tanning process involves toxic substances like chromium, formaldehyde, and other chemicals which means even when it does break, it doesn’t do so without leaving residue.
There are also ethical issues with leather as animals are slaughtered for their skin to make it. Leather is wrongfully considered a byproduct of meat but it’s an industry in its own right, worth $444.78 billion in 2023.
But thanks to material innovation, leather no longer has to come from animals. Vegan leather-like materials can be made from pineapple, cacti, apples, mushrooms, algae, and cork, though it’s worth noting that some degree of plastic is often combined with these for the sake of durability.
But biodegradability isn’t the only way to achieve sustainability. Some recycled shoe brands use recycled textiles and plastics which keeps them out of landfill or from polluting the oceans.
The Anatomy Of A Sustainable Shoe
Shoes are more complex than clothing and require different materials to make each component. Here’s a quick look at the anatomy of a shoe and how sustainable materials can be incorporated:
- Upper: The part of the shoe that covers the top part of the foot. Materials include recycled cotton, recycled plastic, hemp, wool, cork, eucalyptus and vegan leather
- Vamp: Forms the front part of the shoe. It’s made from the same material as the upper, depending on the design
- Toecap: Reinforcement on the toe, depending on the design. This might be metal, carbon fiber or leather.
- Tongue : On lace-up shoes, this material sits under the laces. It’s typically the same material as the upper
- Collar: The opening where you insert your foot. It’s sometimes padded for extra cushioning
- Counter: Extra material at the back of the shoe to give it more structure and support
- Quarter: Forms the back end of the shoe. Typically made from the same material as the upper
- Heel: Depending on the design, some shoes have a heel which is a thick piece of leather or rubber. Cork or wood might be used instead.
- Midsole: Cushioning component between the insole and outsole. It’s the hardest part to make sustainable but some brands use partially recycled EVA foam or Bloom foam, created from harmful algal blooms.
- Outsole: Hard material at the bottom of the shoe, ideally made of natural rubber or recycled rubber, from things like recycled tires.
2. Responsibly Source Materials
Sustainability isn’t just about the nature of the material (whether or not it’s renewable and biodegradable), but where and how it’s sourced. The sourcing and production of renewable materials should be responsibly managed and not contribute to slave farm labor, deforestation (for land and resources), soil health degradation, and water loss.
Some shoe brands use natural rubber in their soles instead of synthetic plastics, as it can be harmlessly ‘tapped’ (just like maple syrup) from the Hevea brasiliensis (rubber) tree, found in the Amazon Rainforest.
Rubber tapping is a sustainable livelihood for Indigenous Amazonian communities, so sustainable rubber should be ethically and responsibly sourced. French sneaker brand VEJA works closely with Amazon rubber tapper cooperatives to help protect the rainforest and provide income for families.
The use of organic materials is another key factor in sustainable shoes. Materials like organic cotton are more environmentally friendly than conventional cotton. Organic cotton is grown without pesticides and toxic fertilizers and uses up to 90% less water than the conventional kind.
Transparency in shoe material sourcing can be a challenge. FDRA points out that shoes can have more than 60 components and materials, unlike clothing.
The best way to ensure responsible material sourcing is through certifications. For example, Allbirds certifies their Merino wool sneakers with ZQ Merino to ensure their wool comes from farmers maintaining high animal welfare standards.
The Forest Stewardship Council (FSC), the Leather Working Group (LWG), the Responsible Wool Standard (RWD),and all of the various different fair trade certifying entities are others you’ll commonly see certifying the ethical sourcing of footwear materials.
3. Manufacture Shoes Ethically
Shoes have become a product of the fast fashion industry.
Like clothing, they’re mass-produced at scale and follow seasonal trends with brands dropping new lines and styles multiple times a year. In 2022, 23.9 billion pairs of footwear were produced globally.
Fast fashion is notorious for championing profits over ethics, using sweatshops that force their employees to work long hours in unsafe conditions for very little pay. Shoe manufacturing is no different and leading brands like Adidas and Nike have come under fire for using sweatshops.
In unethical shoe factories, workers can be exposed to toxic chemicals, heavy metals and dangerous machinery.
Brands making sustainable shoes should focus on social responsibility alongside the environmental impact of their products. This looks like being transparent about their supply chain, working with ethical factories, and being honest about where they could improve.
Certifications are once again a good place to start but it’s still important to carry out your own audits, set a Code of Conduct and maintain close, long-term relationships with factories and suppliers.
4. Give Shoes A Circular Lifecycle
In the US, people throw away over 300 million pairs of shoes every year and 95% of them end up in landfill. Chemical treatments and microplastics leach into the soil and groundwater causing pollution as shoes break down.
It’s also a huge waste of resources considering the shoes’ carbon footprint and labor-intensive manufacturing process since the typical pair of running shoes produces about 30 pounds of carbon dioxide.
So we need to not only make those emissions worthwhile by making shoes last as long as possible, but we also need to be mindful about what happens at the end of that life—because let’s be honest, even the most well-made and cared for shoes simply don’t last forever if they’re regularly worn.
A circular design model keeps valuable resources in circulation for longer and gives a second life to worn-out shoes that would otherwise be thrown out.
Circularity looks like offering take-back schemes like Thousand Fell which invites their customers to return used sneakers to be recycled.
Swiss sports brand On Running also offers a subscription model through its Cyclon™ Program. You use a pair of their qualifying sneakers until they’re worn out then send them back to be recycled and receive a new pair.
Australian brand Etiko has a take-back scheme in partnership with Save Our Soles which recycles their worn-out sneakers into indoor matting while they assess how best to incorporate recycled materials into new sneakers.
Even bigger brands like Adidas and Salomon have also dipped their toes into circularity by launching sneaker lines designed to be returned and recycled, but unfortunately, this is still the exception, not the norm.
5. Factor In Performance & Durability
We put shoes through their paces so they need to be comfortable and withstand high-impact activities like running, hiking and all-day wear alongside weather resistance and weight distribution.
Prioritizing high-quality materials and craftsmanship can give sustainable shoes better performance and durability. This means you get to keep them in use for longer. You require fewer replacements, save money, and prevent waste.
Durability can also apply to how easy the shoes are to repair. While leather and suede aren’t the most ethical or sustainable materials, they can be easy to repair and restore. Most basic repairs like resoling, reheeling, rewelting and zipper fixing can be done at a high street cobbler.
Some sustainable shoe brands also offer their own shoe repair like Dr. Marten’s. They’ve partnered with The Boot Repair Co. to carry out authorised repairs on soles, leather, zippers and stitching.
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