MATERIALS

Sustainable Design
Looking ahead, our design approach is centered around a company-wide drive toward incorporating environmental sustainability into our business practices and our product design.

Expanding our use of environmentally preferred materials as new technologies become commercially viable will allow us to integrate these materials into our products. These materials have added environmental benefits that don't compromise the aesthetic, quality and performance that our consumers expect from Nike products. This allows us to leverage our purchase volumes with our suppliers, making environmentally preferred material options more cost effective. It also encourages our suppliers to develop more sustainable materials since they know there will be a market.

Recycled Polyester
Recycled polyester is a fiber derived from reprocessed, post-industrial and/or post-consumer polyester waste materials such as plastic bottles, consumer textile products, uniforms and textile scraps. We have begun using recycled polyester in many of the products in our All Conditions Gear outdoor line as well as various active apparel items.

Leather
Nike is one of the world’s largest users of white leather. Waste from cutting leather constitutes one of our largest footwear solid waste streams. Recognizing our impact in the athletic footwear industry, we collaborated with tanners and other footwear brands and retailers to found the Leather Working Group (LWG) in 2006. The LWG developed a protocol to assess the environmental compliance and stewardship practices of leather tanneries, and to promote best practices in the industry.

Organic Cotton
Nike’s long-term goal for organic cotton is for every cotton-containing apparel product to contain at least 5 percent organic cotton by 2011. We are currently on track to achieve this ambitious goal. Fifty-two percent of our cotton-containing products produced in FY06 contained a minimum of 5 percent organic cotton. Nike also helped start the Organic Exchange - a multi-stakeholder group committed to helping increase the world's supply of organic cotton.


Other Materials

Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC)
In the late 1990s, Nike- controversially at the time- announced our policy to remove PVC from our product lines due to environmental issues related to its manufacturing and disposal. Removing PVC has required great cooperation in our supply chain and discipline from our design teams. Nike has made real progress in this aim. Virtually all of Nike-branded product is now PVC free. We continue to work our supply chain and with ink suppliers and printers to find and implement attractive and durable alternatives to PVC.