Boohoo, the online fashion retailer, is cutting more than 400 companies from its supplier network following a critical report last year on labour practices at some of those businesses.
The fast-growing merchant on Thursday published a list of 78 approved manufacturers operating across 100 sites in Britain, a dramatic reduction from an estimated 500 suppliers identified in an independent review of the business by UK lawyer Alison Levitt last year.
The action follows the termination of at least 64 factories that couldn’t meet new enhanced labour standards, the consolidation of some suppliers and the elimination of subcontracting.
The move is significant for Boohoo, which owns the Nasty Gal and PrettyLittleThing brands. Improving the transparency and control over the company's supply chain was a key recommendation in Levitt's report, which followed a minimum-wage and safety scandal at supplier factories in Leicester last year.
In her review, Levitt found that Boohoo had prioritised profit and growth, and ignored “red flags” about labour violations, but cleared the company of any direct involvement.
Management has since taken a number of steps to improve its processes and governance, notably appointing UK judge Brian Leveson to supervise the company's "Agenda for Change" reform process.
Leveson, in his second progress report published Thursday, said Boohoo should be given credit for strengthening its sourcing and compliance team, improving training processes for buyers, and auditing most UK suppliers twice during the last eight months, “including in the evenings and at weekends”.
Additionally, Leveson commissioned Tim Godwin, former acting commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, to carry out additional inquiries to address any irregularities in the leadership and management of suppliers' businesses.
Honouring contracts
Leveson said Boohoo was trimming suppliers “responsibly,” honouring existing contracts and supporting manufacturing volumes in Leicester.
Boohoo is carrying out a similar review of its international supply chain and plans to publish an approved manufacturers list by September. This marks a departure in practice for co-founder and executive chairman Mahmud Kamani, who has historically resisted publishing any details of Boohoo's supply chain for commercial reasons.
Irishman John Lyttle, Boohoo's chief executive, said the company was facing up to the "problems of the past," adding in an emailed statement, "This is the not the end of a project for us at Boohoo but the beginning of a new way of working with our suppliers."
– Bloomberg
