VAUDE Climate Footprint

Emissions cannot be completely avoided as long as our global economy is based on fossil raw materials. It is already a small success if emissions are "decoupled"(don't grow at the same rate as the company) even if this is, of course, not enough to combat climate change. We all have to reduce emissions in absolute terms, not just in relative terms in relation to company growth. Nevertheless, a look at the relative development is interesting.

VAUDE has grown tremendously in recent years - more employees, more space, more products, more sales - but also more material consumption, more energy consumption, more company cars, etc.

• We have only been collecting data for "Total emissions VAUDE including materials and energy consumption material production" since 2019, which is why comparison with previous years is not possible.
• VAUDE's sales also grew in the Corona year of 2021 (by 17% compared to the previous year, 2020).
• The total energy consumption per employee at the company headquarters in Tettnang (HQ OEB) has increased again to a more "normal" level after the Corona year 2020. More on energy consumption at VAUDE here.
• Emissions per employee have also increased. In addition, the increased emissions from the next two categories also have an effect here:
• The introduction of two-shift operation and automation as well as significantly increased output led to higher energy consumption and thus arithmetically to more emissions in the VAUDE Manufaktur (even if the total electricity consumption comes from renewable energy sources that do not cause emissions). Unfortunately, this is the opposite of "decoupling" emissions from the company's success, and we are working to significantly increase the energy efficiency at the VAUDE Manufaktur.
• Employee mobility has been the second largest source of emissions at VAUDE's headquarters for years. After a sharp decrease due to Corona in 2020, emissions from both business travel and the daily commutes of our employees have increased again. More about this below and here.

Reducing emissions as the company grows remains a real challenge.

Read more about VAUDE's sales development here

At the company headquarters in Tettnang, the distribution by scope is similar to that for the entire company including the supply chain. However, the share of Scope 1 emissions is somewhat higher, since for this view, only the material quantities that are processed on site in the VAUDE Manufaktur are taken into account for the material consumption and energy consumption for the production of the materials.

As of 2019, we have slightly changed the methodology for determining emissions, as 2019 forms the base year for VAUDE's science-based climate targets and we have followed the current systematics of the Green House Gas Protocol.

Some emission factors have increased over time, for example for flights. In 2019 we began taking all packaging materials fully into account. Therefore, the annual values in the following graph above are not comparable one-to-one. Nevertheless, this graphic provides a general overview of the development of emissions at VAUDE in Tettnang.

In 2020, the "Corona effect" also made itself felt: Lockdowns, production and delivery bottlenecks, many employees in home offices and hardly any business trips led to savings in energy and materials, and thus to fewer emissions.

In contrast, VAUDE generated significantly higher emissions in 2021. The reasons for this lie primarily in the strong growth of the company – in particular, in the growth of the VAUDE Manufaktur. This production facility had an increase of 28 percent in output, so naturally, a much larger amount of material was needed. The transition to climate-friendly recycled and biobased materials was not yet noticeable in 2021.

Associated with the growth of VAUDE Manufaktur is also an increase in residual waste from production. More on this here.

Other reasons for the increased emissions can be found above under "Decoupling emissions from corporate success" as well as in the following graphics.

The biggest opportunities for reducing emissions are material consumption in our production facility. We want to exert even more influence here by increasing material efficiency, i.e. making better use of the material width for the individual cut parts, and by transition to biobased and recycled materials. More about our Made in Germany production here.

Emissions from business travel comprise emissions from company vehicles, air, rail and long-distance bus travel, and overnight hotel stays. We have included packaging in the climate footprint since 2019.

At VAUDE, the areas of business travel and employee commuting regularly rank second in terms of emissions. More on the issue of the "VAUDE Transportation Revolution” here

Employee mobility is a hard nut to crack. Although VAUDE has a Mobility Concept that is often praised as ‘best practice’, emissions from business travel and commuting at our company headquarters in Tettnang make up a major proportion every year.

We achieved our goal of reducing emissions from employee mobility by 10 % by 2020 compared to 2015 for the first time in 2018. Now we have to reduce emissions even further despite higher sales. As a new target, we have agreed to reduce emissions from employee mobility by an additional 25 % by 2024 compared with 2019.

When it comes to mobility, the effects of the Corona pandemic are clearly evident: On the one hand, there was significantly less business travel in 2020 – especially less air travel to VAUDE production countries and less car traffic with company vehicles. This enabled us to save emissions. On the other hand, many employees preferred to drive alone instead of taking the train or carpooling for health reasons. Hopefully, we will be able to reverse this trend once the pandemic is over. The rainy summer of 2021 also unfortunately contributed to VAUDE employees* cycling over 15,000 kilometers less to work.

Business travel also includes the VAUDE company fleet, which we are fully converting to e-vehicles, although this will have an impact on the climate footprint starting in 2022. More about this here.

VAUDE has been working exclusively with green electricity and biogas for many years, so emissions from this are relatively low. More about energy management at VAUDE here

We have already detailed above the increased electricity consumption in the VAUDE factory, which resulted in higher emissions. Higher emissions from heating energy (biogas) are primarily due to the longer heating period caused by the weather.

Two more key figures are of interest when considering emissions at the company headquarters in Tettnang: the total emissions at the site based on the number of employees and on production output. Due to higher emissions overall, these two key figures will also be significantly higher in 2021.