JanSport

Nov 07, 2020

JanSport is an American backpack brand founded in 1967 and headquartered in Alameda, California. It creates backpacks, bags, accessories, and outdoor recreation products for consumers around the world.

VF Corporation owns JanSport along with The North Face, Timberland, Vans, Dickies, Eastpak, Eagle Creek, among others (more than 30 outdoor, activity-based lifestyle, and workwear brands in total).

JanSport specializes in backpacks for commute, campus, laptops, travel, and other outdoor adventures. It also creates fanny packs, lunch bags, and accessories for the whole family.

JanSport is committed to improving its environmental performance and social responsibility in the supply chain. Together with its parent company and other corporate siblings, it innovates to have a lower impact on the environment.

JanSport aims to preserve the world and outdoor environments for future generations. It wants to promote sustainability and reduce its carbon footprint drastically.

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Sustainability Rating: 5/10

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Category: Bags, accessories

For: Women, men, children

Type: Basics, backpacks

Style: Casual

Quality: Medium

Price: $$

Sizes: XS-L

Fabrics: Cotton, polyester, nylon, rubber, leather

100% Organic: No

100% Vegan: No

Ethical & Fair: Yes

Recycling: Yes

Producing country: Albania, Bangladesh, Bulgaria, Cambodia, Canada, China, Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, France, Georgia, Greece, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Jordan, Keny, Mauritius, Mexico, Republic Of Moldova, Morocco, Nicaragua, North Macedonia, Pakistan, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovenia, Taiwan, Thailand, Turkey, Ukraine, United States, Vietnam

Certifications: Bluesign

Sustainability Practices

JanSport makes some of its products with nature in mind. Its Recycled SuperBreak collection represents its vision for the future of outdoor gear with minimal waste and recycled materials.

JanSport uses a small proportion of sustainable materials such as better cotton (BCI), recycled polyester, and regenerated nylon.

The backpack brand creates a lot of its products with polluting, synthetic, petroleum-based fibers, such as conventional polyester and nylon made from oil.

As part of VF Corporation, JanSport uses the same supply chain as its parent company. It publishes a list of its manufacturing and processing facilities and makes it available publicly on its corporate website.

It also monitors most of its supply chain and all its main production sites to ensure compliance with social and labor standards.

The company is expanding its traceability and transparency efforts as well as collaborating with human rights experts, governments, international organizations, and non-profits to conduct ongoing human rights due diligence.

The 2020 Fashion Transparency Index gave VF Corporation a score of 59% based on how much the group discloses about its social and environmental policies, practices, and impacts. VF Corporation earned 7th place in the top 10 most transparent brands.

JanSport doesn't use any exotic animal skin, or hair, fur, angora. But it uses leather to manufacture many of its bags and accessories.

Leather production is cruel and unethical. It also harms the environment by releasing toxic chemicals, producing greenhouse gases, and generating wastes. More sustainable alternatives exist.

Sustainability Goals

Together with VF Corporation, JanSport commits to being a leader in the large-scale commercialization of circular business models by 2030.

It wants to contribute to local communities and empower consumers to live more active and sustainable lifestyles.

JanSport has reduction targets for its greenhouse gas emissions in line with meeting the goals of the Paris Agreement.

It partners with global consultancy the Carbon Trust to gather data from its suppliers and plans an absolute reduction of Scope 1 and 2 greenhouse gas emissions by 55% by 2030 (2017 baseline).

JanSport also plans an absolute reduction of Scope 3 greenhouse gas emissions by 30% by 2030 (2017 baseline) through a focus on farm-to-retail materials, sourcing operations, and logistics.

JanSport aims to halve its upstream environmental impact, farm-to-front door by 2050. It has a system in place to improve the lives of 2 million workers and their communities by 2025.