Burtons mission and vision for CSR is to strengthen their approach towards sustainability based on integrating all business partners of their value chain, using their brand power to foster change towards more sustainable business practice.

Ali Kenney is the CSR specialist in charge surrounded by a crew of passionate and like-minded individuals to support the mission outlined with Burton’s CEO and co-founder, Donna Carpenter. For the past several years, they’ve been working with every aspect of Burton’s global business and supply chain to identify opportunities to improve the brand’s impact on our planet and its people.

Burton has a quality control team on site and in the factories (20-40 people) and is a bluesign® system partner, which means that they have efficient chemical management in their apparel supply chain by using the bluesign® RSL (Restricted Substance List). For Winter 2017, 80% of the outerwear line and 50% of First Layer are bluesign® approved products.

Burton Statement: “We are riders, and we take climate change personally. We need to take a stand. The environment is in crisis, and it’s in everyone’s best interest to act. We are not where we want to be and we recognize that we have opportunities to improve across the board. As we continue on the journey toward sustainability leadership, we invite the broader Burton community to join in the work of securing the future of the sport and lifestyle we all love – and to hold us accountable for ongoing improvement.“

A three-year goal to reduce water, waste and energy in their offices and warehouses has been set in 2013. So far, the emissions have been reduced as planned, but not yet reported on in any standardized environmental reporting format.

The head-office in Burlington uses 100% renewable energy.

Burton has a policy in responsible event management – the The Green Events Guide outlines how to reduce the impacts of all Burton Events: through food choice, consumable products used during the event, and preferences on type of transportation (carpooling, bio diesel buses etc).

On exhibitions, the booth consists of mainly recycled material.

Spare parts are provided for repair. Burton has a really strong repair policy for it’s boards (48 h repair-guarantee), uses Gore-Tex® certified repair centers for it’s technical apparel and promises a lifetime guarantee on all soft-goods that are at the $250 USD price point and above. All bags and luggage also have a lifetime warranty. All boards with the channel have a 3-year warranty.

Burton has a transportation strategy in place to reduce emission from factory to warehouse- their central warehouses are in the EU, Japan, Australia, China and USA. All transport is by ships, which has the least impact – with airfreight only in emergency cases.

Packaging is now redesigned with 80 % recycled content, FSC-certified paper based packaging instead of plastic.

Old garments are donated for charity. Old boards sent to warranty which can’t be repaired are re-cycled into small accessory items. Burton currently uses 60-80% of every board returned to transform them into new items like the beer sample holders made for the neighboring beer brewery, Switchback. For the parts of the boards that are unused in this process, they are working with a local recycler to grind them up and use them in other products and industries, and therefore kept out of landfill or incineration.