By Jessica Shankleman, Source: BusinessGreen

Sports brand Puma has launched its first range of products to be certified as 100 per cent biodegradable or recyclable, promising that the new sportswear results in an “environmental impact” that is almost a third lower conventional counterparts.

The new range, dubbed InCycle, includes jackets, t-shirts, flip flops, tracksuit trousers and a backpack that have been developed using a variety of different eco-friendly materials as part of the company’s high profile Environmental Profit and Loss initiative.

The handbags, trainers and t-shirts are made from biodegradable materials, including organic fibres that contain no toxic chemicals and a new biodegradable plastic called APINATbio.

When disposed of the materials will be safely broken down by microorganisms into biological nutrients, while parts such as metals, textiles and plastics, can be used to create new products.

Meanwhile, the recyclable products include a backpack made of polypropylene which can be broken down to its original substance and used again to make new bags.

Similarly, the tracksuit jacket is made of recycled polyester derived from old PET plastic bottles. The jacket can then be turned back into polyester granulate, which can be used as a secondary raw material for other products made of recycled polyester.

Reiner Hengstmann, global director of Puma’s environmental protection division Puma Safe, said all the products in the InCycle collection had been certified by the Cradle-to-Cradle Products Innovation Institute.

The new products are the latest development in a long-running sustainability programme from Puma, which last year saw the company reveal that it had calculated the monetary value of the environmental impacts of its individual products, including the impacts created by its global supply chain.

Drawing on this Environmental Profit and Loss Statement (EP&L) framework, Puma found that the InCycle biodegradable trainers and cotton t-shirts cause 31 per cent less environmental impact than their conventional counterparts.

“Puma’s Cradle to Cradle Certified Basic InCycle products represent a tremendous step forward in reducing our environmental footprint and giving consumers a more sustainable product choice,” said Hengstmann.

“The InCycle Basket [trainer] and Basket Tee [t-shirt] have been analysed as part of Puma’s first Product Environmental Profit and Loss Account published in October 2012 and the results speak for themselves, showing that these two products impacted the environment by a third less than their conventional counterparts.”

Puma has also started placing collection bins in its stores in partnership with recycling company I:CO, encouraging customers to bring back any unwanted clothes from any brand, so they can be recycled, biodegraded, or reused.

A spokeswoman for Puma told BusinessGreen that the Incycle range would be hitting the shelves next month.

The products are expected to sell at a comparable price to conventional products or will be marginally more expensive. This is partly because the cost of innovative bioplastics means the materials are still more expensive than leather, but also because of high import levies on synthetic fabrics.