Latest news with #CFX2025
Yahoo
23-07-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Kearney's 2025 Circular Fashion Index reveals unmet scaling potential
The Circular Fashion Index Report (CFX 2025), now in its fifth year, provides an extensive analysis of the industry's progress in adopting circular practices. It encompasses 246 apparel brands from 18 countries, covering five key product categories namely fashion, footwear, sports, outdoor and underwear and lingerie. The report measures brand performance across seven dimensions that span the entire lifecycle of a product and beyond. Kearney Americas fashion and luxury lead and co-author of the report Nora Kleinewillinghoefer said: "While our top-ranking companies continued to pull ahead, the majority of brands find themselves stuck between ambition and execution, making progress in some facets, but not transforming themselves across all dimensions in an integrated way. "For most companies we researched, circularity efforts are too often siloed in sustainability departments, rather than being embedded into product development, sourcing, supply chain, and commercial operations." Key findings of CFX 2025 Over 70% of brands score in the "moderate" range across the CFX dimensions, indicating that circularity is becoming a standard part of their strategic commitments and initial programmes. Only 3 to 5% of brands demonstrate "extensive" implementation levels, highlighting a major conversion gap in scaling up these practices. Europe and North America are at the forefront with average scores of 3.6 and 3.4 respectively. Driven by improvements in several markets, Europe has seen a substantial increase since 2024. It is also influenced by a stricter regulatory environment that includes incentives for repair, extended producer responsibility schemes, and upcoming eco-design requirements. Kearney's industrial redesign practice, PERLab partner and Americas lead Namrata Shah said: "Even in the strongest-growing areas, progress in the adoption of circular design principles and raw material reuse was mostly limited to shifts from 'limited' to 'moderate' maturity. What's needed now is a strategic reframing and circularity must be treated as a lever for growth, not just a compliance exercise. This means embedding it into how brands design, source, sell, and service their products." Commenting on the analysis, Kearney partner Dario Minutella said 'execution gaps' stem from the absence of critical enablers that include scalable infrastructure, integrated systems, cross-functional ownership, and business models that are financially sustainable. 'The message in this research is clear: while directionally correct, the industry's pace must now shift gears. As regulation moves from policy to enforcement, incremental gains are no longer sufficient. Brands need to move from declaring ambition to delivering evidence, systematically, and at scale," Minutella added. "Kearney's 2025 Circular Fashion Index reveals unmet scaling potential" was originally created and published by Just Style, a GlobalData owned brand. The information on this site has been included in good faith for general informational purposes only. It is not intended to amount to advice on which you should rely, and we give no representation, warranty or guarantee, whether express or implied as to its accuracy or completeness. You must obtain professional or specialist advice before taking, or refraining from, any action on the basis of the content on our site.
Fibre2Fashion
18-07-2025
- Business
- Fibre2Fashion
Circularity scores rising, but YoY progress slowing: Kearney CFX 2025
Rather than pacing ahead, overall progress related to circularity in brands covering the fashion, sports, outdoor, underwear and lingerie, and footwear categories appears to be leveling off, perhaps hinting at a maturing market that is finding it harder to unlock full-stage impact, according to the fifth edition of Kearney's Circular Fashion Index (CFX 2025) report. The CFX evaluates performance across seven dimensions that together reflect a product's full life cycle. The survey covered 246 brands across 18 countries. While many brands have committed to circularity, few have translated intent into consistent, scaled execution. Rather than pacing ahead, overall progress related to circularity in fashion, sports, outdoor, underwear and lingerie, and footwear brands seems to be leveling off, the fifth edition of Kearney's Circular Fashion Index said. While many brands have committed to circularity, few have translated intent into consistent, scaled execution. The leap from moderate engagement to scaled circularity is rare. More than 70 per cent of brands now fall into the 'moderate' zone—scoring between three and seven points across the seven CFX dimensions—a signal circularity has entered the mainstream with most brands committing to it strategically and beginning to implement relevant programmes. However, only 3 to 5 per cent of brands reached the 'extensive' implementation level (more than 7 points), underscoring a significant conversion gap. The leap from moderate engagement to scaled circularity remains rare, a research report from the company noted. Even in the strongest-growing areas—adoption of circular design principles and raw material reuse—progress was mostly limited to shifts from 'limited' to 'moderate' maturity. The past 12 months reflected continued positive, if unequal, movement. While overall progress was made, i.e., average and median scores went up, not all brands or categories improved equally. Both the average and median scores increased by 0.20 points, reaching 3.40 and 3.20 respectively. While, on one hand, this is a signal of sustained momentum, it is also slightly below the rate of improvement seen last year. Over the past five years, average scores have risen by 1.4 points, and median scores by 1.6 points. The bottom 80 per cent of brands actually remained constant in 2025, suggesting the mid-tier is struggling to keep pace. Meanwhile, only five brands scored above 7.0, and fewer than a fifth exceeded the 5.0 mark—despite this group nearly doubling since last year. This growing divide is also visible at the top. The top 10 list has remained largely unchanged for the third year in a row, with only two new brands entering the list: Arc'teryx and Decathlon, a research report from the global management consulting firm headquartered in Chicago said. This pattern suggests that strong performers are continuing to pull ahead, while the broader market remains locked in a state of 'moderate' maturity. Today, most brands find themselves stuck between ambition and execution, progressing, but not fully transforming. Most of the low-hanging fruit has been picked: basic circularity initiatives, awareness campaigns, capsule collections, or localised take-back programmes. But the transition from piloting to full-scale circularity execution often lags, the research found. Circularity efforts too often still remain siloed in sustainability departments rather than being embedded into product development, sourcing, supply chain and commercial operations, it noted. 'While directionally correct, the industry's pace must now shift gears. With regulation moving from policy to enforcement, incremental gains will no longer suffice. Brands must evolve from declaring ambition to delivering evidence—systematically, and at scale. And that starts by fully engaging across all seven dimensions,' the company's research report said. The Research found frontrunners are starting to shift from symbolic gestures to systemic change. Much of the past year's CFX growth stemmed from two key dimensions: circular design and closing the loop initiatives. Developments reflect two complementary paths: one focuses on system-level design transformation and the other on high-visibility product innovation. But both are essential to move from pilot thinking to platform building and ultimately toward embedded, scalable circular design, the report added. Fibre2Fashion News Desk (DS)
