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Schwalbe Uses VERSO for Transparent Supply Chains
Since its founding in 1922, the family-owned company Schwalbe has stood for innovation, quality, and responsibility. In this interview, Felix Jahn, Head of Corporate Social Responsibility at Schwalbe, shares what environmental and social responsibility means for his company and how VERSO supports Schwalbe in achieving a more sustainable supply chain.
7 Questions for Felix Jahn, Head of Corporate Social Responsibility at Schwalbe
1. What does sustainable responsibility mean at Schwalbe?
Our vision is to lead the way in developing environmentally friendly products. We are pioneers in circular economy innovations and take responsibility for future generations. For example, we take back our used products via our retail partners and recycle them into new tubes and tires. This year at Eurobike, we will present our first tire made with recycled materials from our own tire recycling process.
2. How do you describe your mission when it comes to sustainable responsibility?
We try to take a holistic approach to sustainable responsibility, which is why we have defined four areas of key action areas. The first is our products – this includes environmentally friendly products as well as our circular systems. The second area is our company, covering aspects such as our Cradle-to-Cradle building, employee development, and our mobility concept. Another important area is our social engagement. As a family-owned company, we are deeply rooted in our region, but we also look beyond local borders, as our supply chain is global. This brings us to our fourth action area: our supply chain, where we are very proud of our Fair Rubber project.
3. What are the next areas of action Schwalbe has defined in terms of sustainability?
In the coming years, our focus will be on significantly reducing emissions both at our local sites and, in particular, in our global supply chain. At the same time, we aim to expand our recycling systems across Europe and continuously increase the use of renewable and recycled materials. And, of course, we want to ensure transparency in our supply chain.
4. The supply chain is one of Schwalbe’s four pillars of responsibility. What does responsibility mean in the context of your supply chain?
We are committed to creating a transparent and traceable supply chain to protect our stakeholders and uphold our high standards. We have a strict code of conduct to ensure human rights, labor and environmental protection. We actively engage in dialogue with our stakeholders and supply chain partners to maintain full visibility into what happens at every stage. A good example of this is our collaboration with Fair Rubber e.V., the Fair Trade association for natural rubber. Through this partnership, we have established close contact with smallholder rubber farmers, in order to improve their working and living conditions bit by bit.
We are also very proud of our 50-year partnership with our production partner, Hung A from Korea. We produce in Indonesia and Vietnam and are very well-informed about local conditions and processes. To extend this level of oversight to our upstream suppliers, we are working with VERSO.
5. How did you become aware of VERSO, and why did you choose the VERSO Supply Chain Hub?
We got in touch with VERSO through a customer two years ago, which gave us the opportunity to get to know the platform in detail. In the meantime, VERSO has become the industry standard in the bicycle sector. That’s why it was clear to us that when we fully committed to taking responsibility in our supply chain, VERSO would be our partner of choice.
6. How do you evaluate the VERSO Supply Chain Hub, and which features do you find particularly useful?
With VERSO, we significantly reduce our workload because most of the manual documentation is eliminated. This also supports the digitalization of our Green KPIs. The platform is very intuitive and easy to use. One of the most valuable features is the visualization of the supply chain, which helps us better understand our partners. VERSO allows us to collect, analyze, and export data more efficiently. Additionally, the VERSO support team is always available to assist us when needed.
An interesting aspect worth mentioning is that, as users of the VERSO Supply Chain Hub, we actually play a dual role. We are both a registered supplier on the platform and a VERSO customer. In other words, we provide our customers with our company data through the platform while simultaneously requesting data from our own suppliers to gain insights into our supply chain.
7. What are your future plans regarding sustainable responsibility, and what role does the supply chain play in them?
We are already measuring and reducing our emissions at our own sites, but we understand most of our emissions originate within our supply chain. That’s why we aim to collaborate even more closely with our suppliers in the future – to make progress together, take joint responsibility, and achieve our goals.
When it comes to our supply chain, this means that after mapping our Tier-1 suppliers, we also want to focus on the relevant upstream suppliers.
We take a holistic approach to sustainable responsibility. This starts at the beginning of the supply chain, extends through production and usage, and continues beyond the product’s lifecycle – so the circle closes.