In her first blog as CEO, Ying McGuire shares her reflections on Cascale’s next chapter and asks members to tell her what they need next.
A stack of reference notes sat on my desk with a glass of water within reach.
I had just finished recording my welcome message to Cascale members. After only a couple of retakes, I felt pleased — and more energized than I’ve felt in my decades-long career spanning Corporate America, entrepreneurship, and leading multistakeholder organizations. Needless to say, starting my first week as chief executive officer of an impact-driven organization whose mission is aligned to mine felt both exciting and deeply meaningful.
After our first Member Town Hall last month, I felt even more energized (some might call reference to the Energizer Bunny’s marching drumbeat).
While the excitement of this opportunity is contagious, it’s not a responsibility I take lightly. This responsibility transcends Cascale, across industries and communities, no matter their proximity to production. Because the climate crisis does not respect industry boundaries. And decent work cannot be an afterthought.
Manufacturing is personal to me. Having grown up in a textile family in China, I’ve seen its power to both build economies and strain ecosystems. I am here because I respect this industry’s potential and feel a deep responsibility to ensure its power is used to create a more sustainable and equitable future.
Cascale is not simply a job to me. It’s a mission, and I’m here as long as it takes to deliver on it confidently.
In my initial conversations with our members, the message has been clear. For too long, the industry has prioritized speed and cost over sustainable value, creating friction with our shared goals. What our community truly craves is standardization and simplified data collection—not just to reduce audit fatigue, but to redirect those precious resources and time toward driving on-the-ground impact. We need a clear, actionable path forward that we can all stand behind.
The chasm between our high-level climate ambitions and the grueling, on-the-ground realities of global production is widening, and vague promises will no longer bridge it. To move from fragmentation to real-world impact, we must transform our collective desire into immediate, coordinated action that shifts the discussion from what’s possible to what’s working and replicable. Only through this disciplined, unified effort can we turn the tide.
The urgency is clear. As noted in our State of the Industry report, carbon dioxide – the most abundant greenhouse gas – accounts for roughly two-thirds of greenhouse gas emissions and is primarily produced by the combustion of fossil fuels. This industry, like others, has a long way to go in decarbonization, as well as in taking accountability for the human impacts.
The gap is only growing, and it’s dotted with more challenges.
I’ve heard directly from members that the environment they are operating in is not getting easier. It’s getting harder. There’s more scrutiny, more compliance needs, more cost pressures, more volatility, more traceability desires, more sourcing shifts, and more geopolitical uncertainty than ever before. Expectations are rising and the world’s tolerance for vague promises is gone.
Yet what makes industry challenges difficult to navigate alone is also what makes it so powerful to move forward together.
Throughout my career leading across NGOs and global technology companies, I’ve found the most enduring solutions come from bringing diverse perspectives together around a shared goal. Lasting progress happens when stakeholders align not just around ambition — but around action.
As I shared in my day one video, the biggest problems do not get solved by one company or NGO. This is the work of Cascale.
Just two weeks into my role with Cascale, I visited Rick Ridgeway, one of the founding fathers of Cascale, at his home at the Turtle Conservancy, hearing him share the story of how the CEOs of Walmart and Patagonia had the foresight to bring their peers to the table, catalyzing the standardization of sustainability measurement and data for impact. We must salute to the foresight of these long-time members — our sustainability pioneers — who worked tirelessly on the methodology and tools that drove the industry’s unmatched results in adoption. They are the foundation of our work and continue to be a vital part of our future. Our intent for expansion into adjacent consumer industries — which share a similar supplier base or manufacturing processes — is not a shift away from their legacy, but a strategic effort to amplify their work and best practices in this broader mission. Honoring the visionary foresight of our founders, we invite every sustainability leader in our community to take up this mantle, ensuring this shared mission remains a driving force as we scale our collective impact and write the next chapter of transformation together.
Many members have shared their vision of Cascale’s future as a big-tent convener to inspire change. To turn that vision into reality, I invite you to share your ‘magic-wand moments’ — let us know exactly what you need from us next to drive this change forward.
In our most recent industry-wide survey, 86 percent of respondents said they are confident Cascale will drive meaningful change on decarbonization by 2030. Likewise, 87 percent expressed confidence in Cascale’s ability to help advance better working conditions across the industry.
Through the Higg Index, Cascale provides a trusted methodology and shared framework for measuring progress — from meeting regulatory compliance to adopting best practices — while ensuring data integrity through our verification process. Worldly serves as our exclusive technology partner, providing the platform for businesses to access these tools and scale their impact. Together we can turn data into meaningful action.
As I step into this role, you will see three pillars at the center of my first 90-day focus: I’m intent on removing blockers before they sideswipe progress, stewarding financial discipline, and seeking to align the foundation of member needs with Cascale strengths.
Now the work is to continue building from that foundation — together.
The industry has its work cut out for itself to advance progress on climate and decent work. One ongoing challenge remains Tier 2 production, which can account for an estimated 45 to 70 percent of Scope 3 emissions. Addressing this part of the value chain is essential to driving meaningful climate progress at scale.
Programs like Cascale’s Manufacturer Climate Action Program (MCAP) help manufacturers build the practical foundation needed to set and meet science-aligned targets. The MCAP Annual Report 2025 showed what’s possible when 85 manufacturers in 19 countries – spanning 446 facilities – get the guidance they need to champion decarbonization.
Together with more than 80 organizations, Cascale recently helped establish the definition for Foundational Environmental Performance (FEP) — an important step toward greater industry alignment around baseline environmental management practices.
And decarbonization can’t happen without supplier investment. Last year, under Colin Browne and Harsh Saini’s leadership, we began the formative work of integrating Better Buying into Cascale, bringing supplier-informed purchasing practices data into its Responsible Purchasing Practices (RPP) strategy and strengthening our ability to elevate supplier voices across global value chains. As another hallmark effort, Better Buying completed its ninth annual Better Buying Purchasing Practices Index (BBPPI) cycle under Cascale, engaging 23 subscribing buyer companies and collecting 1,598 ratings from 1,360 suppliers.
We also saw a major milestone in 2025, with more than 13,500 Higg Facility Environmental Module (Higg FEM) verifications completed across more than 70 countries.
These are meaningful steps forward. But there is still more to do. Now is the time to roll up our sleeves and deliver the progress this industry needs – and it starts with member voices.
There’s inspiration found at every corner when we listen to members’ first-hand experiences. At my first public appearance with Cascale, we jointly convened brands with the Social & Labor Convergence Program (SLCP) and Worldly in Denver ahead of the American Apparel and Footwear Association (AAFA) Traceability & Sustainability Conference. Our members sparked lively peer discussions and shared powerful examples of the tools at work.
This is merely one touchpoint of many. And these conversations transcend borders or boundaries – from the Member Town Halls, forthcoming “Huddles with Ying,” and culminating in the defining event of our year: the 2026 Annual Meeting in Athens, where we will come together to build our future together and translate our collective vision into the real-world impact that defines our next chapter.
Our new name, Cascale, was chosen to reflect our commitment to collective action at scale. My intent as CEO is to live up to that name by identifying the next major industry challenge we can solve together, using our past success in standardized measurement as the blueprint for what we can achieve. It starts with listening.
I firmly believe that our industry’s greatest potential is unlocked through collaboration. Luckily, even amid broader conversations around sustainability losing momentum, our members continue to tell us they remain committed to moving forward, combining a business case with personal passion.
Our members have made their voices clear: we remain deeply dedicated to moving forward together, turning our shared passion into a powerful, collective force for change.
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