Europe’s leading responsible sourcing show, Source Home & Gift closed its doors on Wednesday following a successful and insightful four days, connecting the global sourcing community. The show attracted leading retailers including Fenwick, NEXT, Cancer Research, Waitrose, John Lewis, Laura Ashley, Liverpool FC, Pro Cook, CostCutter, Make Believe Ideas, Lloyds Pharmacy, Barnardo’s, Longleat, DHL, House of Marbles, PetCo, National Trust for Scotland and many more, sourcing responsibly made homewares, furniture, gifts, toys, textiles, packaging, stationery and greetings from hundreds of manufacturers and brands delivering great quality products and much-needed newness from around the world.
Source Home & Gift’s largest edition to date championed ethical and sustainable manufacturing as a catalyst for positive change in retail, bringing audiences on a journey of sourcing and storytelling; innovative makers and artisans from emerging markets such as Senegal, Ghana and Nepal joined over 400 manufacturers and suppliers from over 25 countries including Bangladesh, China, Egypt, Hong Kong, India, Pakistan, Philippines, South Africa, United Kingdom, and United States. Providing an invaluable hub to connect the global sourcing community, Source Home & Gift is where connections turn into collaboration and small artisan makers can be empowered.
The Responsible Retail Stage played host to internationally renowned industry professionals who discussed the success and challenges of sustainable retail, latest trends and shared invaluable advice on how to foster global collaboration. Opening on day one with ‘Future Global Retail Trends’ led by Kate Shepherd and Matt Parry from The Future Collective; this global retail trend briefing provided a deep dive into the evolution of some of the most influential themes and transitions in retail strategy and design. Exploring key transitions in retail from Local Legacies and the revival of local traditions to Recraft, the notion of original craftsmanship being emphasised in retail. The session also covered the impact of AI, Parry said, “As the world becomes more reliant on technology, retailers must find the perfect balance between art and science; leveraging Al’s benefits in the most valuable way, while not losing sight of the human touch.”
Day two welcomed head of trends at Insider Trends, Jack Stratten who led the invaluable discussion ‘Sourcing and Storytelling: The Selling Power of Retail Transparency’, as shoppers become increasingly conscious of brand transparency, retailers from emerging to heritage brands are discovering the power of supply chain storytelling. Later, with much to learn from the fashion industry’s approach to waste reduction SATCol’s (Salvation Army Trading Company) ‘How SATCol are closing the loop in home and giftware’ seminar put the spotlight on SATCol retail partner Fibresort, who are successfully on their journey to reducing the environmental impact of textiles and educated on how to effectively remove barriers in circularity that contribute to extending the useful life of home and giftware products.
Tuesday saw Louisa Mordaunt, Founder of I Love My Job and Sarah Jordan, Founder – Y.O.U Underwear discuss ‘Building a B Corp – How, why and is it necessary?’ with Source’s Suzanne Ellingham. With B Corp becoming one of the most recognised standards of social and environmental performance, transparency and accountability, the duo helped audiences understand the B Corp certification process, and how to undergo an internal transformation process to meet B Corp standards.
Suzanne Ellingham added: “One of the reasons we wanted to talk about B Corp is that it gives businesses the framework to look at their business holistically so they can recognise the good they already so and work to grow sustainably, but also it really doubles down on measurements. When you measure something, you create a benchmark, then you create meaningful improvement to make sure that you are always moving forward. Importantly, once you are going through that process, you can see what good looks like in terms of the performance of other businesses going through the process. We wanted to highlight this as we believe this is something that really gives people a starting place in terms of understanding their own foot print, and that any business, product or service, can use this framework.”
