As a globally recognized apparel manufacturer with over a century of industry leadership, Hirdaramani Group continues to play a defining role in advancing sustainable and responsible practices across the apparel value chain. A Cascale member since 2013, the Group operates vertically integrated facilities across Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Vietnam, and Africa, partnering with leading global brands to deliver end-to-end apparel solutions and enable more transparent, future-ready supply chains.
Guided by its Future First Sustainability Roadmap, Hirdaramani integrates environmental stewardship, social impact, and responsible governance across its operations. Within this broader strategy, participation in Cascale’s Better Buying Purchasing Practices Index (BBPPI) serves as a strategic platform to strengthen buyer-supplier partnerships and support the evolution of responsible purchasing practices across the industry.
Manufacturers are expected to keep advancing climate and social priorities while managing the daily realities of sourcing and production. Purchasing practices play a direct role in shaping that environment. Planning changes, delayed payments, and pricing pressure can affect how suppliers manage resources, schedule production, and sustain longer-term efforts.
Better Buying brings those conditions into view through structured supplier feedback on buyer purchasing practices. For Hirdaramani Group, this creates a practical opportunity to contribute insight from the manufacturing side of the value chain. A consistent feedback process can bring alignment for day-to-day operations and open stronger conversations with buyers about how to improve together.
Aligning the Group’s sustainability progress with accountability, transparency, and stronger working relationships throughout the supply chain, Better Buying supports a more consistent and constructive dialogue between suppliers and buyers.
Hirdaramani approaches Better Buying not only as a reporting mechanism but also as a practical tool for engagement and industry advancement. Across its Future First Roadmap, the company has connected sustainability progress with clearer structures, stronger reporting standards, and greater transparency and accountability. Better Buying fits within that approach by offering the Hirdaramani team a confidential way to share supplier experience and help inform more effective purchasing practices over time.
As noted by Nikhil Hirdaramani, Director at the Hirdaramani Group, the tool offers a “secure and anonymous feedback channel” that has supported more constructive and action-oriented engagement with customers. Better Buying has also driven stronger, more transparent conversations that contribute to continuous improvements over time.
Better Buying complements Hirdaramani’s broader sustainability efforts by strengthening accountability and more closely linking operational performance to buyer relationships.
Collaboration is central to Hirdaramani Group’s approach to sustainability. Through its Future First Roadmap, the Group works closely with global brands, industry platforms, and stakeholders to advance progress across climate action, social impact, traceability, and innovation.
Participation in Better Buying strengthens this collaborative approach by:
In this way, the partnership becomes part of how progress is shaped and sustained across the value chain.
Hirdaramani’s experience shows how structured supplier feedback can strengthen partnerships and support more effective purchasing practices. By connecting operational insights with strategic buyer engagement, Better Buying helps bridge critical gaps in the apparel value chain.
As expectations on sustainability continue to grow, aligning purchasing practices with these ambitions will remain essential. For Hirdaramani Group, Better Buying strengthens this effort by connecting day-to-day operational realities with buyer relationships, helping ensure that progress across the value chain is both practical and sustained.
For more on Hirdaramani’s broader sustainability journey, listen to Nikhil Hirdaramani on Cascale’s Source of Good podcast episode, “From Tailors to Global Trailblazers: Talking Climate Action with Hirdaramani and ASICS.”
Participate in the BBPPI
First-time participants can access it here, while returning participants can simply log in.
In 2026, workplace safety standards and protections are essential, but they are not enough on their own. Fairness in purchasing must be part of the conversation.
Key Takeaways
For those with careers in fashion and consumer goods, the name Rana Plaza is unforgettable.
Just 13 years ago, this devastating factory collapse claimed 1,134 lives and injured several thousand in Dhaka, Bangladesh. Out of it came a new vision of garment worker protections in the form of the landmark Bangladesh Accord.
A turning point for the industry, the Accord paved the way for brand accountability and responsibility never before seen. It helped establish a stronger foundation for worker safety, well-being, and protections for the most vulnerable. This remains especially important because women of color make up the majority of the garment workforce.
After the Bangladesh Accord’s expiry came the binding International Accord and successor agreements like the Pakistan Accord (renewed in January) with over 100 global brand and trade union signatories, many of whom are Cascale members and Better Buying subscribers.
Like its predecessor, the Pakistan Accord supports continued progress on fire, electrical, structural, and boiler safety in factories, while also strengthening worker awareness, complaint mechanisms, and other protections. The International Accord has also continued to evolve in response to emerging risks, including the growing urgency of heat stress in production environments.
Today – as always, workplace safety standards and protections are essential. And when we talk about protecting workers, we also need to talk about the purchasing decisions that shape conditions throughout global supply chains.
When it comes to purchasing practices, Cascale’s Better Buying captures this information directly from the source: suppliers.
Now in our 10th survey cycle for Better Buying Purchasing Practices Index (BBPPI), we’ve captured how the seven categories of purchasing practices influence supply chains in reality. Last year’s survey, again, reaffirmed that repeat Better Buying brand subscribers outperform the benchmark. Across areas like planning and forecasting, design and development, cost and cost negotiation, sourcing and order placement, payment and terms, and buyer-supplier management, Better Buying continues to show that commercial decisions directly influence stability, trust, and working conditions in supply chains.
That is why responsible purchasing practices are a core part of decent work.
Through confidential, anonymized supplier feedback, 1,360 suppliers participated in Better Buying last year. Their input helps create a clearer picture of how purchasing practices are experienced in reality and where change is still needed.
Because to truly honor the past and the improvements made, we must continue to take an active role in driving accountability for our collective future. If we want supply chains that are safer, more stable, and more equitable, factory safety protections must continue, and so must the work to improve the purchasing practices that shape outcomes every day. Thirteen years after Rana Plaza, that responsibility remains with all of us.
As we reflect on this anniversary, supplier voice remains essential to continued progress. If you are a supplier that has worked with a buyer in the past 12 months, we encourage you to share your experience (entirely for free and anonymously) through the Better Buying Purchasing Practices Index (BBPPI). First-time participants can submit here. And if you are returning to Better Buying, please proceed to this gateway.
Only together can we ensure that fairness in this industry extends to every stakeholder.
In this guest blog, Nate Herman, executive vice president of the American Apparel & Footwear Association (AAFA), shares why heat stress guidance matters now and what effective implementation will require across the value chain.
Key Takeaways:
Heat stress is not a new issue, but it’s accelerating at a pace that the apparel and footwear industry must take further action upon. It is influencing how factories operate, how companies think about worker well-being, and how supply chains prepare for operational disruption.
For an industry that produces globally and sells globally, heat stress has implications across sourcing, production, and business continuity.
That is why AAFA has been working with industry stakeholders to develop the AAFA Guide to Protecting Workers from Heat Stress, focusing on what it takes to move from awareness to practical implementation.
Over the past several years, companies have made incremental progress on social responsibility and environmental performance, yet not fast enough, as recent Cascale reports noted. Expectations across supply chains have also become more complex, and companies are managing more requirements than ever before.
Heat stress brings those pressures into sharper focus because at the center of this industry is – and always will be – people.
It affects workers directly. It affects production timelines. And it raises important questions about how expectations are set and applied across the value chain.
Across many major sourcing regions, rising temperatures and more frequent extreme heat conditions are making this issue harder to ignore, particularly in factory environments where ventilation, pace of work, and other workplace conditions can intensify risk.
The goal of this work is to help the industry move toward a more consistent and practical approach.
As part of this process, AAFA engaged dozens of stakeholders across the value chain. This included recent input gathered with support from Cascale, bringing in perspectives from both manufacturers and brands.
A few themes came through clearly. First, there is broad recognition that this is an important issue and that guidance can play a useful role.
Second, there is a strong focus on how that guidance is applied in practice. Manufacturers emphasized the need for approaches that reflect on-the-ground realities, including existing systems, operational constraints, and local conditions. Brands raised similar questions around how guidance can be integrated into current compliance programs without creating duplication or unintended consequences. Across both groups, there was a consistent message: clarity, consistency, and practicality matter.
The AAFA guidance is intended to help companies and facilities take a more structured approach to identifying, monitoring, and managing heat stress risks across the supply chain.
In practical terms, the guidance is designed to support companies in several areas, including:
It also encourages factories to establish heat thresholds, adjust workloads, and water and bathroom breaks in accordance with heat conditions, and strengthen alignment with applicable workplace health and labor requirements.
Just as important, based on recommendations from Cascale members and other stakeholders, the guidance emphasizes the importance of communication between buyers and suppliers, and between suppliers and their workers. Every decision to protect workers from heat stress can involve costs, impact production, affect workers, and change timelines. Regular communication between suppliers, buyers, and the workers themselves, is critical to make any effort to protect workers from heat stress a success.
The objective is to give companies guidance they can actually use — guidance that helps translate a growing body of research, policy attention, and industry concern into practical action on the factory floor.
As with any industry guidance, how it is used will ultimately determine its impact. That includes how expectations are communicated, how they are implemented at the facility level, and how companies work together when challenges arise. It also requires being mindful of unintended outcomes, such as additional audits, overlapping requests, delivery delays, additional costs, or requirements that are difficult to operationalize in practice. Getting this right will require continued dialogue across brands, manufacturers, and other stakeholders.
The AAFA Guide to Protecting Workers from Heat Stress is part of an ongoing effort. It will continue to evolve as the industry builds more experience and as conditions change.
AAFA will continue working with industry partners to refine the guidance and support implementation. For example, AAFA has planned an upcoming open industry webinar, “Implementing the AAFA Heat Guidance,” on May 19, which will provide an opportunity to walk through the guidance in more detail and discuss what practical implementation may look like across the value chain.
Efforts like those facilitated by Cascale are an important part of that process, helping to surface practical insights and ensure that a range of perspectives are reflected. Heat stress is a complex challenge, but it is one the industry is increasingly equipped to address. Progress will depend on alignment, collaboration, and a shared focus on what works in practice. By continuing to build on industry input and focusing on practical application, there is an opportunity to develop approaches that better support workers and strengthen the long-term resilience of global supply chains.
Time is running out. Subscribe to Cascale’s Better Buying by March 31 to manage supply chain risk, strengthen supplier relationships, and advance responsible purchasing practices.
The industry is not short of pressure right now: margins are tight, climate expectations are rising, regulation is getting sharper, and geopolitical uncertainty hasn’t exactly calmed down.
Through it all, brands have asked suppliers to move faster, invest more, and absorb volatility. Yet many overlook one simple but powerful step: providing an opportunity for suppliers to share how those purchasing decisions are experienced in practice. This is what Cascale’s Better Buying provides – and now is the perfect time to get involved.
Brands that subscribe to Better Buying empower their suppliers to provide valuable information that can strengthen how they manage risk. It starts with becoming a Better Buying subscriber today – not tomorrow. The Better Buying Purchasing Practices Index (BBPPI) survey is now open to suppliers April 1–May 31.
Purchasing practices are no longer just an operational nicety tucked away in sourcing teams. No, they are a strategic lever deployed across organizations that can either stabilize performance or quietly undermine it. With sign-ups closing next month for brand and retailer subscribers, the BBPPI, a comprehensive, anonymized survey, exists to shine a light on how buying practices are working in reality for suppliers. It’s not polished policy statements or investor slide decks, it’s the quantitative truth of a company’s day-to-day commercial relationships. And it’s all sourced confidentially and securely – providing a safe, credible way to understand what is happening on the ground across your supply chains. As we know in consumer goods, when supply chains span dozens of countries and hundreds or thousands of suppliers, being everywhere is an impossible feat.
Here are five reasons why relationships matter more than ever in 2026, and why Better Buying needs to be part of your supply chain strategy.
When lead times shrink without warning, when orders shift late in the process, or when payments are delayed – the impact is immediate. It shows up in production schedules, workforce stability, cash flow, and long-term planning. That instability does not just affect suppliers; it increases risk across the value chain and makes disruption more likely at the worst possible moment. For years, Better Buying surveys have captured these knock-on effects, drawing on confidential supplier insights to hold a mirror up to industry practices.
More companies are starting to treat purchasing discipline as part of their broader risk management framework. The BBPPI provides structured feedback on where friction exists and where improvements are taking hold. That visibility is not about blame – but rather about mutual accountability. It is about reducing surprises, strengthening relationships, and understanding where commercial practices may be creating unintended exposure.
In volatile markets, predictability becomes a competitive advantage.
We talk a lot about decarbonization targets: Scope 3 reductions, supplier-level investments in cleaner energy, and efficiency improvements. But suppliers cannot invest in emissions reduction if margins are constantly under pressure or planning cycles are unstable. In reality, both capital and innovation follow confidence.
There is a direct connection between decent work and climate action, which is at the heart of Cascale’s work. In fact, last year’s BBPPI report noted that 2025 was “marked more by setbacks and emerging risks than by advancement.”
We know the phrase, “it’s not rocket science.” With commercial predictability comes space to invest in long-term decarbonization. If climate ambition sits on one side of the table and purchasing pressure sits on the other, something eventually gives.
The BBPPI helps highlight where those tensions exist and where they are being resolved. It provides a clearer picture of whether commercial models are reinforcing sustainability goals or quietly working against them.
Across key markets, due diligence expectations are expanding.
It is no longer enough to have a policy in place; companies are increasingly expected to demonstrate how commercial practices align with social and environmental commitments. Make no mistake, that is a governance question.
Structured feedback mechanisms, credible benchmarking, and documented improvement plans are becoming part of the toolkit for demonstrating oversight. Participation in the BBPPI can support those internal conversations by providing comparable quantitative data and a clearer evidence base. Evidence travels well to Boards, investors, and regulators alike.
This is not about optics. It is about being able to show how commitments translate into day-to-day practice, especially when external scrutiny intensifies.
Many organizations have ambitious sustainability strategies, while sourcing teams operate under intense cost and speed pressure. Those tensions are real, and they do not disappear simply because a strategy has been approved.
Essential for any executive dealing with material sustainability and operational risks, BBPPI data pinpoints where misalignment exists and where collaboration is improving. It gives sustainability leaders and procurement leaders a common reference point built on real supplier feedback, not anecdotes or assumptions.
As well, it sharpens and flags potential risks for operations and finance leaders. That shared visibility can shift conversations internally, moving them from “who is responsible?” toward “what can we improve together?”
That is usually where meaningful change begins.
The 2025 BBPPI results showed something important: even in a disrupted market, progress is possible. Some practices improved, while other areas remain stubbornly challenging. That is the reality of systemic change.
Improvement, however, only happens when feedback is structured, comparable, and acted upon. Supplier voices matter, as does the willingness of brands and retailers to listen and respond. The stronger the dataset, the clearer the signal for the industry as a whole.
But brands and retailers have to take that first courageous leap to subscribe by March 31 (now closed).
Resilience is not built on good intentions alone. It is built on disciplined feedback loops that allow companies to course-correct before pressure turns into crisis.
Participation is not about ticking a box. It is about understanding how commercial practices are performing under pressure and where there is room to strengthen them. In 2026, responsible purchasing is not a values debate; it is a business continuity strategy.
Brands and retailers, do not miss your chance to learn more and subscribe. You will gain structured, confidential supplier feedback in a customized report detailing how your purchasing practices are performing in practice.
Better Buying Subscription Form for Buyers
New analysis shows over 60 percent alignment between Cascale Better Buying survey data and leading due diligence frameworks.
Amsterdam, Hong Kong, Oakland (CA) – February 11, 2026: Cascale Better Buying has released Mapping Cascale Better Buying Responsible Purchasing Practices Survey Questions to the CFRPP and PP-DD Frameworks analyzing how its Responsible Purchasing Practices surveys align with two widely used industry due diligence frameworks: the Common Framework for Responsible Purchasing Practices (CFRPP) and the Purchasing Practices Human Rights Due Diligence (PP-DD) Framework.
The analysis maps supplier feedback captured through Better Buying tools against each framework’s requirements to better understand where responsible purchasing and human rights due diligence expectations are already reflected, where additional coverage can be achieved through existing services, and where targeted refinements could further strengthen alignment. The report also identifies areas that fall outside Better Buying’s core focus or practices that suppliers cannot reasonably observe.
“Our goal was to bring greater clarity to how supplier-reported data can support responsible purchasing and human rights due diligence efforts,” said Katie Hess, head of product at Cascale Better Buying. “This mapping shows that supplier feedback already provides meaningful insight into many core practices, and it highlights practical ways companies can strengthen alignment without adding unnecessary complexity.”
Mapping to the CFRPP
The CFRPP was developed in 2022 by a working group of multi-stakeholder initiatives as a shared reference point for companies and supporting organizations to understand and improve responsible purchasing practices in supply chains. Better Buying Institute, whose assets were acquired by Cascale in 2025, was consulted during the development process and contributed input as part of the broader stakeholder consultation and benchmarking process.
Mapping the Cascale Better Buying survey questions to the CFRPP revealed:
Mapping to the PP-DD Framework
The PP-DD Framework was developed by the Responsible Purchasing Practices Working Group, a coalition of multi-stakeholder organizations working to advance responsible purchasing and human rights due diligence in global supply chains. The PP-DD Framework defines the core actions companies should be accountable for when aligning purchasing practices with human rights due diligence expectations.
Mapping the Cascale Better Buying survey questions to the PP-DD Framework revealed:
Summary
Together, the findings demonstrate how supplier voice data can support responsible purchasing practices and human rights due diligence when used alongside established frameworks. The report reinforces Cascale Better Buying’s role in helping companies understand where they are today and where practical improvements can be made to support decent work through more responsible purchasing.
Media Contact: Forster Communications, cascaleforster@forster.co.uk
Labor conditions in the consumer goods industry have improved — but serious problems remain. How do we solve them? According to Annabel Meurs, Executive Director of Fair Wear, it begins with stronger worker representation, more formal brand-supplier agreements, and a willingness to listen to all stakeholders. But that’s just the start. Discover how alignment across initiatives can reduce duplication and drive real change.
Subscribe today on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts
Learn more about Fair Wear and the HRDD Academy at www.fairwear.org
Check out Mammut at: www.mammut.com
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Produced by Cascale and Hueman Group Media. Views and opinions expressed during the podcast are those of the individuals expressing them and do not necessarily reflect those of Cascale or Hueman Group Media.
For more than 30 years, Dr. Marsha Dickson has worked to make fashion more fair. From research and teaching to launching the Better Buying Institute, she’s led the change to center supplier voices and responsible purchasing in the pursuit of decent work. Now, as she steps away from day-to-day leadership and into a much-deserved retirement, Dr. Dickson reflects on what’s changed — and what still needs to be done.
Subscribe today on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts
Click here to learn more about Better Buying
Visit Under Armour
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Produced by Cascale and Hueman Group Media. Views and opinions expressed during the podcast are those of the individuals expressing them and do not necessarily reflect those of Cascale or Hueman Group Media.
Today, supply chains are more complex than ever.
But that doesn’t mean they have to be difficult to navigate. That’s why our guest, Lukas Puender, co-founded Retraced, an online platform that connects thousands of apparel suppliers and brands and allows them to seamlessly share their supply chain data. More data also means more transparency, a key component of sustainability.
Subscribe today on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts
Learn more about Retraced
Check out Marc O’Polo’s sweatshirts here
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Produced by Cascale and Hueman Group Media. Views and opinions expressed during the podcast are those of the individuals expressing them and do not necessarily reflect those of Cascale or Hueman Group Media.
Sustainability isn’t only about climate — it’s also about people. In this episode, John Morrison, CEO of the Institute for Human Rights and Business (IHRB) and author of The Just Transition, explains why workers’ rights must also be at the center of sustainability efforts. He also shares what a “just transition” to a sustainable industry looks like, with measures that ensure no one is left behind.
Subscribe today on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts
Learn more about the IHRB at ihrb.org
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Produced by Cascale and Hueman Group Media. Views and opinions expressed during the podcast are those of the individuals expressing them and do not necessarily reflect those of Cascale or Hueman Group Media.
Cascale, Fair Wear, SLCP will dive deeper on creating impactful human rights due diligence at the Annual Meeting 2025.
Cascale’s Annual Member Meeting, “A Movement for All,” takes place in Hong Kong September 15 to 17. The event will address how we, as an industry, can collectively address and solve two of the most critical challenges facing our industry today: Combating Climate Change and Supporting Decent Work For All.
It’s an outsized challenge but a shared commitment. Leaders today are those frontrunner brands, suppliers, policymakers, and non-corporate players that are doubling down on climate change and decent work as a business imperative. Together, they are confronting a dizzying array of duplicate initiatives, repeat data sources, and outdated auditing systems in place. By collectively refining the approach to measuring, verifying, and enhancing social and environmental performance, compliance and responsible purchasing practices becomes a nearer reality.
Compliance is a growing area of interest for industry players, and convening organizations have a role to play. In its background note on regulatory developments concerning due diligence for responsible business conduct, The Role of Sustainability Initiatives in Mandatory Due Diligence (OECD, 2022) recognizes Multi-Stakeholder Initiatives (MSIs) as playing a crucial role, acting as both facilitators, providing tools and guidance for companies, and verifiers, assessing and potentially certifying company practices. But the guidance also notes that, despite recent examples of initiatives converging and aligning approaches, the landscape is still complex and confusing, with 455 ecolabels and various environmental schemes listed in the Ecolabel Index at the time of writing.
In this playing field and true to this year’s event theme, Cascale, the Social and Labor Convergence Program (SLCP), and Fair Wear will come together to be greater than the sum of our already formidable parts to promote impactful Human Rights Due Diligence (HRDD) by brands and suppliers. We aim to support stakeholders on their journey through building and leveraging joint tools, best practices, and accountability mechanisms.
This joint work builds on discussions we originally held at our Annual Meeting in Boston, back in 2023, exploring the potential of HRDD as an organizing principle for the industry, and aims to be complementary – rather than additive. Because it’s only together that can we scale accountability in an actionable way.
Between us, we believe we have all the tools a company needs to conduct impactful due diligence. Cascale owns and develops the Higg Index suite of tools, and since February, has owned the Better Buying toolset informed by surveys on brand and retailer purchasing practices. We have over 300 members and 40,000 Higg Index users. Fair Wear led the industry effort towards alignment on the Common Framework for Responsible Purchasing, while its HRDD Academy supports brands to better understand the HRDD cycle and practically implement human rights due diligence both within the company and across the supply chain. SLCP now boasts over 250 signatories and its Converged Assessment Framework (CAF) forms the foundation of Cascale’s Higg Facility Social & Labor Module (Higg FSLM).
It’s an executive priority. “Cascale, SLCP, and Fair Wear see great opportunities in driving impactful HRDD by working more closely together,” said Harsh Saini, interim chief executive officer of Cascale. “Together, we have immense convening power, expertise, and volumes of credible and actionable data. We are all speaking the same language on due diligence, and our tools fit together and complement each other, providing brands and retailers with everything they need for their due diligence journey.”
As well, the work becomes a shared responsibility. “We’re united around a shared vision,” added Annabel Meurs, executive director of Fair Wear. “This will set the tone in the industry on what impactful due diligence looks like, holding brands and retailers accountable in making progress and to scale up best practices that will have a real impact on workers.”
Steve Harris, COO of SLCP , underscored: “Our three organizations will work together to develop and cross-promote each bilateral partner’s tools, drive collective action, sharing HRDD knowledge and best practice across the whole of our membership and signatories, and advocating for decent work with policymakers.”
The next opportunity to hear more about our collective expression of deepened and more targeted coordination will be at Cascale’s Annual Member Meeting in Hong Kong, September 15 to 17. The event will feature presentations from Fair Wear and SLCP on key topics, including making responsible purchasing practices the norm within the industry, and what needs to happen next to drive real movement on audit fatigue. You can also visit the Cascale, Fair Wear, and SLCP booths in the exhibition area to find out more about the tools and guidance available.
