About Higg

We’re helping consumer goods businesses accelerate transformation towards a more sustainable future.

Our Vision

We have only a decade to radically transform how humanity impacts the planet.

Yet today, few businesses can accurately know the environmental and social impact of their products – despite growing expectations from shoppers, investors, and governments. Without full visibility into a product’s impact, we believe that the sustainable transformation our world demands will remain impossible.

Higg is on a mission to change that. Bringing together decades of experience in sustainability, technology, and consumer goods, we’re building an integrated digital platform to enable brands, retailers, and manufacturers to accelerate progress.

Selecting fabrics

Our Story

Higg was launched in 2019 as a public-benefit technology company, to build software for assessment methodologies developed by the Sustainable Apparel Coalition. Known as the Higg Index, this suite of measurement tools is the most widely used within apparel and footwear industries.

In addition to hosting the Higg Index, we’ve expanded our platform’s capabilities to include advanced analytics, tracking, and disclosure tools. In addition, we’re proud to work with multiple partners across industries to integrate complementary data and technical capabilities, to provide our users with a single source for ESG performance data.

Explore our technology.

Our Team

Jason Kibbey

Chief Executive Officer

“It’s a rare moment in your life where you get to work on something that has the potential to change things at a planetary level. It’s a humbling privilege.”

Mimi Frusha

Chief Operating Officer

“We have a global crisis on our hands. Being part of Higg is how I contribute to what we all have ahead of us.”

 

John Armstrong

Chief Technical Officer

“The data and systems we deploy at Higg are critical tools in our sustainability evolution. Each and every day I am excited to be a part of that process.”

 

James Schaffer

Chief Strategy Officer

“We are at a critical juncture. Companies must effectively leverage complex data in order to drive sustainability performance, meet climate goals, and prove their commitments to ethical labor practices.”

Del Hudson

SVP Market Impact

“Change always requires vision, but complex change also demands a common language and scaleable solutions. That’s what Higg is building. I’ve never been more excited by an opportunity to participate in creating the future we want.”

Progress

Read our 2022 impact report to learn how Higg customers rely on our data to catalyze measurable improvements.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is Higg?

Higg is a technology platform that helps consumer goods companies measure and improve the sustainability of their supply chain – with a unique full value chain approach across carbon, water, energy, social, and labor impacts.

 

Launched in 2019, Higg hosts a range of assessment methodologies, such as the Sustainable Apparel Coalition’s Higg Index and the Apparel Impact Institute’s Carbon Leadership Program. Higg is trusted by global brands, retailers, and manufacturers to provide the comprehensive intelligence needed to move from impact insights to action.

Who uses Higg?

Higg is trusted by major global brands, multi-vertical retailers, and manufacturers around the world. Over 50,000 users (representing tens of thousands of manufacturers and 500+ brands of all sizes) rely on Higg data to inform product and value chain decisions, and to exchange data with other stakeholders across their value chain.

What impact has Higg enabled for its customers?

Sustainability leaders need data they can trust to make lasting changes.Year-over-year data shows that Higg helps its customers transform their business’ global environmental and social footprints, and make measurable progress across metrics including emissions, water consumption, and working conditions. 

 

For example, since 2019, manufacturer environmental scores have improved nearly 20%; 12% more facilities have implemented energy use strategies in 2020, compared to 2018; and nearly half of users have shared their results with more than one value chain partner, effectively improving transparency within the value chain.

What is the relationship between Higg and the Sustainable Apparel Coalition?

While we share a common mission, the SAC and Higg have been separate entities since 2019 – a non-profit coalition and a public benefit corporation respectively. The SAC is a strategic and valued partner of Higg. The Higg Index suite of tools (for which the SAC owns the Intellectual Property, Trademark, and continues to develop) remains a core offering on our software platform, and we remain its exclusive licensee.

Does Higg host other assessments or have other partnerships?

Higg is the data partner for the Global Fashion Agenda, working with them to bring together disparate data sources from across the industry to provide a comparable, contextualized baseline of industry environmental and social performance, in an effort to accelerate progress towards climate and other impact reduction goals. Higg also partners with Product Lifecycle (PLM) companies and other organizations to scale the use of consistent data across the industry.

Where does the data you provide to users come from?

Much of the supply chain impact data we provide is collected directly from specific manufacturers about their operations, using ​​consistent, comparable industry frameworks. Data from these managed self-assessments can then be verified through third-parties. This combination of bottom-up primary data within top-down industry frameworks is an effective way to provide brands and retailers with accurate data specific to their sourcing and value chain.

 

For the Higg MSI (the publicly available database of verified and reviewed materials impact, for which the Sustainable Apparel Coalition owns the Intellectual Property and Trademark), the primary background database is Sphera: the industry accepted database which provides over 15,000 process datasets, and 1000 models from over 60 industry associations. The database is updated twice yearly to include any newly submitted data (which can be submitted by a materials manufacturer or a third-party). This data is reviewed by a large team, led by an independent 3rd party. Documentation explaining this review process is available through the SAC. 

 

As with all data, if producers refuse to provide datasets and LCA information, their scores will not be as accurate. The Sustainable Apparel Coalition and Higg invite all materials manufacturers to submit data to increase the quality and accuracy of insights to help businesses make more informed decisions.

Do you score or rank materials as being better or worse for the environment?

Higg does not rank materials or make recommendations. ​​ Our goal is to provide the best available environmental and social data to our customers (including materials data), and we work with trusted partners and respected industry organizations to host methodologies for evaluating environmental impact – but we’re not a certifier nor does our software rank materials. 

 

Instead, the Higg MSI methodology displays a series of “scores” to express the relative magnitude of one material’s impacts in relation to those of a comparable material (for instance, comparing different fibers for a t-shirt, or potential materials for a coat). These scores are expressed in different units for different impact areas: for instance, global warming potential measured in kg of CO2 eq, eutrophication measured in PO4 eq, and water scarcity measured in m3 of water. 

 

It’s also important to note that brands and product designers do not use this data on its own, but rather within the context of a specific product. The Higg Product Module incorporates materials LCA data along with other inputs to model impacts for the full development, use, and end-of-use for a product, giving businesses an accurate picture of a product’s entire lifecycle. These product design tools are used by brands of all types and sizes to understand tradeoffs and benefits of alternative materials in their products. As a source of data, Higg will continue to provide the most scientifically proven datasets and methodologies, and encourage ongoing additions to the materials dataset.

Why does the Higg MSI exclude microplastics?

While the scientific community knows that microplastics are harmful to the environment and human body, it is still a relatively new environmental concern.

Unfortunately, the science isn’t advanced enough within the LCA field to track the actual damages to the environment. To use an LCA to measure impact, there must be defined and agreed upon damage categories to measure.

Higg has engaged with multiple organizations and pays attention to the ongoing studies and will add data as soon as it’s scientifically proven and peer reviewed.

Which industries and types of businesses can use Higg?

While Higg is best widely-used within the apparel and footwear industry, Higg also works in industries such as outdoor, home goods, automotive, personal care, electronics, and toys. Many customers have successfully used our solutions for performance management in other categories, and we are actively establishing partnerships across industries. We’re committed to evolving our solutions to help other verticals that have been asking for a proven framework for impact reduction.

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