Social & Labour Supplier Rating
Data from each factory assessment is fed into our internal information systems, as the basis for our Social & Labour Factory Rating and our Social & Labour Supplier Rating, which is provided to other business functions, including buying teams, to help brands make informed purchasing practices.
Suppliers Social & Labour Performance is assessed within four overall performance areas:
- Responsible Supply Chain Management (20%): An assessment of a suppliers’ management systems to ensure competent management of human and labour rights risk and ability to prevent code of conduct violations.
- Collaboration with BESTSELLER (20%): This is an assessment of the suppliers’ communication with BESTSELLER, and can be demonstrated by commitment to follow up on factory remediations, up-front disclosure of critical factory incidents, commitment to info meetings and training seminars conducted by BESTSELLER as well as commitment to social or environmental impact initiatives.
- Factories' social and labour performance (60%): This is an average performance level of factories under the supplier, according to BESTSELLERs Factory Social & Labour Performance rating. This rating is calculated based on the Factory Standards Programme assessments.
- Engagement with social sustainability in the community: As a prerequisite for a supplier being rated A, the supplier must engage in national, and international sustainability forums, or factory sustainability activities and engage with initiatives that support local communities in manufacturing countries.
Our Social & Labour Requirements are designed to address the identified salient risks among our tier 0, 1 and 2 supply chain production units. Our assessment therefore covers over 150 indicators of risk during on-site visits.
We’re committed to promoting dignity, equality, and safe working conditions for all people across our value chain.
As part of that commitment to generating positive impact we engage in industry initiatives, and we also enroll suppliers in a range of workplace programmes. These programmes target industry-specific challenges, such as women empowerment, workers' rights and workplace health and safety.
We identify and monitor environmental risks in our supply chain and use the insights from independent specialist consultants to upgrade our factory assessment methodology, policies, and environmental risk mitigation work going forward. And we measure performance through our Supplier Environment Rating and focus on environmental impact initiatives where they can make a difference.