TrusTrace launches 4th Industry Playbook: A New Framework to Streamline Data Collection to Comply with Industry Regulations and De-risk Supply Chains

TrusTrace announced the release of its fourth Industry Playbook: The Data Advantage – A Practical Guide to Building De-risked, Compliant and Future-Ready Supply Chains, launching during the Global Fashion Summit in Copenhagen.

Amid unprecedented regulatory pressure, escalating climate risk, and rising demands for transparency – resulting in significant reporting burdens for suppliers – this playbook introduces The TrusTrace Compliance Canvas™: a timely, practical framework designed to help brands and manufacturers collaborate more effectively on a streamlined, standardized set of supply chain data, supported by direct insights from industry stakeholders.

The playbook features interviews with leading brands including adidas, Hugo Boss, and Primark, alongside pioneering suppliers Epic Group, Karacasu Tekstil, and Impetus Group. These stakeholders share their approaches to data collection and traceability, as they navigate compliance with evolving regulations and environmental targets amid ongoing policy uncertainty.

“At Primark, we’ve focused on creating clarity for our suppliers by aligning on the data that matters most and building the internal systems and skills to use it well. Working with TrusTrace has helped us turn complex data requirements into something more manageable for our teams and suppliers,” said Cari Atkinson, Head of Product Traceability and Assurance at Primark.

“My North Star is to get supply chain-related data to the same robustness as financial data. That’s where we need to get to, with an effective data landscape and a standardized approach to data collection and evaluation,” said Sigrid Buehrle, SVP of Sustainability and ESG at adidas.

“This work is going to create a demand for data… and the lack of harmonization across countries means we need a taxonomy... besides just the [rule of] law,” said Tércio Pinto, Head of Innovation at Impetus Group.

Looking ahead, Policy Hub offers expert insight on the future policy landscape, and Textile ETP shares perspective on how the global manufacturing community must prepare, along with a corporate climate litigation briefing from The London School of Economics Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment. Finally, TrusTrace explains how dynamic risk modelling can power more proactive and resilient supply chains.

A playbook for action

The playbook is designed to equip fashion brands and suppliers with key insights for more strategic and effective data collaboration, structured around four key pillars:

• The Minimum Data Package – The TrusTrace Compliance Canvas™: A streamlined summary of the essential data points needed to comply with industry-relevant regulations, offering a common foundation for collaboration and reducing the data collection and reporting burden.
• Understanding Data Requirements: A clear breakdown of current and imminent Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) regulations, outlining what data is needed, why it matters, and how to begin preparing.
• Practical Insights from Industry Leaders: The playbook features exclusive insights from adidas, Hugo Boss, and Primark, as well as supply chain perspectives from Epic Group, Impetus Group, and Karacasu Tekstil – spanning tiers from raw material sourcing to garment finishing. Contributors candidly explore the current state of data collection – still largely reliant on documentation and manual inputs – and what’s needed to evolve toward a future that demands verifiable impact data and traceable, digital records.
• Executive Briefing: The Future Risk Outlook – Expert insights from Textile ETP, Policy Hub, TrusTrace, and the London School of Economics on the growing legal, financial, and reputational risks facing companies, and how robust supply chain data strategies can serve as a key tool for risk mitigation.

A call for pragmatism and partnership

The playbook makes it clear: supply chain data should no longer be just a tool for compliance – it can be a powerful lever for smarter sourcing, better investment decisions, and long-term risk mitigation. Yet too often, manufacturers’ deep knowledge of practical implementation is overlooked when data is collected simply to tick regulatory boxes, rather than to generate meaningful insight.

“A fascinating insight from these interviews is that despite the already huge data burden, with myriad tools and many platforms and certifications, what's collected is mostly documents, not meaningful data or numbers for calculating and addressing actual environmental impacts. It's mere foundational due diligence,” said Brooke Roberts-Islam, the book’s author and a longtime sustainability journalist.

Contributing brands and suppliers consistently emphasized that subjective interpretation of regulations, coupled with a lack of standardization of methodologies and certifications, was a barrier to achieving real-world outcomes.

“As data becomes the new cornerstone of compliance and climate readiness, brands need more than intention – they need infrastructure,” said Shameek Ghosh, CEO and Co-Founder of TrusTrace. “This playbook outlines what actionable, standardized data collaboration should look like.”