On a mission to empower customers to reduce their climate impact, London-based menswear brand LESTRANGE and climate-tech start-up Vaayu have pioneered the first automated, science-based life cycle calculator, Re_Count, to help customers see how their fashion habits impact their environmental footprint.
Customers worldwide are looking for ways to reduce their mark on the planet in an era where retail is responsible for 25% of global carbon emissions, and the fashion sector alone is on track to generate 2.1 billion metric tons in 2030.
The digital web-app, developed by Vaayu, was designed to help LESTRANGE’s customers understand the impact of their clothing and care choices through an interactive online experience that explores shopping and aftercare habits using live data within the context of an annual carbon budget*. During the fashion-frenzy of Black Friday, it offers a new lens for customers to shop more intentionally, encouraging awareness around the impact that these purchases have on the planet over their lifespan.
With Re_Count, customers can play with various scenarios by answering a set of questions to assess how decisions such as product selection and aftercare choices can extend the life of a garment and, in turn, decrease its footprint over the full product lifetime. The fluctuating CO2e impact of making small changes, like modifying washing methods, is visualized through infographics and equivalencies so that customers can really understand how their choices shape up against their environmental footprint, with easy tips on how to make reductions. The complex nuances are simplified so that customers can explore different levers to see how adjustments such as wearing an item for longer between washes, reducing the washing temperature or holding on to it for an extended period of time can either increase or decrease the overall footprint of that garment in a way that has never been seen before.
Vaayu Co-Founder and CEO Namrata Sandhu says: “Re_Count marks the first time an interactive, science-based tool of this granularity has been launched to the consumer market, quantifying emissions data live at a per wear level to inform customer choice. Vaayu is committed to helping the retail sector reduce its impact at a B2B2C level, and we’re so proud to partner with brands and businesses like LESTRANGE to pioneer new technologies that have the ability to shift customer behavior for the better. There is a real hunger for this information, and with the scale of the climate crisis, we need to encourage carbon literacy.”
Will Green, Co-Founder of LESTRANGE adds: “Bringing the fashion industry’s footprint inside planetary boundaries will only happen by considering every phase of a product’s life cycle. With Re_Count we’re bringing to market a first of its kind approach to empower and hopefully inspire customers to make more intentional decisions with the way they use and care for their clothes – and crucially – giving people context for how their decisions ladder back to wider science based targets – or their own carbon budget – all in an easy to explore calculator.
We’re incredibly proud to have partnered with Vaayu in realising this idea of giving people the keys to their own clothing carbon budget. We know it won’t solve fashion’s climate impact by itself but it’s another small step toward a systemic change in our relationship with consumption and understanding our impact on the planet.”
Learn more with Re_Count: https://LESTRANGElondon.com/pages/RE_COUNT
About LESTRANGE
LESTRANGE is a luxury menswear brand that designs finer essentials for life. Following its ‘With Less, Do More’ ethos, the brand focuses on timeless pieces designed to simplify the wardrobe with versatility and longevity in mind. The 24 Trouser, LESTRANGE’s signature product and building block of the modular wardrobe, is made from 100% certified regenerative and fully traceable cotton and has been worn by cultural icons including Tom Holland, Eddie Redmayne, Frank Lampard and Michelin-star chefs alike.
LESTRANGE has reimagined every stage of the clothing life cycle in order to reduce its impact across every stage including launching the world’s first-ever rejuvenating laundry tablet, using only renewable and recycled materials like regenerative cotton, and offering free repairs to extend the life of clothes. The brand strives to inspire its community through a connection with nature, leading LESTRANGE to adopt a biophilic design blueprint across all of its stores. In 2023, LESTRANGE opened its first biophilic store in Coal Drops Yard, London and its first international store in Amsterdam. LESTRANGE is a certified B Corporation.
About Vaayu
Vaayu is the world’s first automated software empowering brands and businesses within the retail ecosystem to track and cut their carbon and environmental impact in real-time. By leveraging proprietary AI and machine learning technology, Vaayu calculates impacts like emissions, water and waste across product, packaging and logistics using certified LCA methodology to provide granular insights and inform data-driven decision-making.
Through global partnerships, Vaayu has pioneered research into the climate impact potential of circular business models with Vinted and Otrium, and calculated product footprints at scale for Klarna and RedCare, arming businesses and millions of consumers with robust impact data to guide more sustainable consumption. Other partners trusting Vaayu to guide their reductions include Veja, Missoma, ASKET, Ace & Tate and Wunderman Thompson Commerce.
In 2023, Vaayu was named a finalist for Fast Company’s Innovation by Design Award, one of TechRound’s SaaS66 and was a Bronze Winner in The Lovie Awards ‘Websites & Mobile Sites: Sustainability & Environment’ and ‘Climate & Sustainability’ categories. Vaayu’s Co-Founder and CEO Namrata Sandhu was awarded Reuter’s Sustainability Trailblazer 2023, and 2022 awards include TIME’s 2022 Best Inventions, Fast Company’s 2022 Next Big Things in Tech and Europas 2022 Hottest Climate Tech.
For more information, visit our website: https://www.vaayu.tech/