Oritain Discusses Equitable Partnerships at Innovation Forum’s Sustainable Apparel and Textiles Conference 2026

Sustainability in 2026 is fundamentally supply chain management, and supplier relationships are where most of the work needs to happen. Yet while brands are increasingly pledging long-term partnerships, the Better Buying 2025 Garment Industry Scorecard found that industry-wide progress on purchasing practices has stalled.

So where is the disconnect and what does real partnership actually look like in practice?

That was the focus of the panel Oritain joined at the Innovation Forum Sustainable Apparel and Textiles Conference in Amsterdam: “Fair purchasing or failed partnerships? What does real supplier-brand collaboration look like in practice?”

Gemma Lynch, Chief Customer Officer at Oritain, took to the main stage alongside fellow panelists to unpack the tensions and trade-offs in sourcing relationships, and how the industry can shift from brand-led directives to supplier-informed collaboration that shares investment and risk.

Our Membership Program is designed to make this shift practical, not theoretical: a structured, programmatic approach to origin verification that helps brands, retailers, and suppliers move from ad-hoc testing and one-off audits to ongoing, defensible assurance, with clearer expectations, more consistent evidence, and stronger alignment across participating partners.

7 key takeaways from the panel

Across the discussion, one theme was consistent: progress only scales when brands, retailers, and suppliers work from the same evidence base, with shared expectations and shared accountability.
 

1.      Supplier access and internal alignment

Often, suppliers cannot get in the room with the people making decisions that affect them. Sourcing strategies, material choices, costing, compliance, and delivery timelines sit across different functions. Without alignment between those teams, suppliers struggle to get clear answers, resolve trade-offs, or invest with confidence. The challenge compounds when every brand partner brings a different set of standards, timelines, and evidence requirements to the table.

 

2.      Reducing complexity through stronger partnerships

When brands work with too many suppliers across too many standards, both sides get stretched and there is little room for genuine investment in the relationship. The panel highlighted that consolidating supplier bases and working with fewer suppliers more deeply, rather than spreading commitments thinly across many, can reduce friction (including duplicated audit effort) and create the conditions for shared investment in capability, data, and improvement programs.

 

 

3.     Aligning internal incentives with sustainability strategy

Several panelists pointed to a hard truth: you cannot ask buying teams to optimize for margin, speed, and optionality while also expecting them to make decisions that increase resilience and reduce risk without changing incentives. Tying buyer KPIs and bonus structures to sustainability and due diligence outcomes is one practical lever to align short-term purchasing decisions with long-term strategy.

 

 

4.     Where risk really enters the supply chain

Risk does not sit exclusively at Tier 1. It often enters much earlier at blending points, redistribution hubs, or through intermediary trade routes that traditional documentation cannot reliably see. As scrutiny on origin claims increases, suppliers are investing earlier and buying differently from deeper tiers to protect those claims upfront, not “explain them away” later.

 

 

5.     Moving verification earlier in the supply chain

The discussion highlighted the need to move verification earlier in the supply chain. Adopted too late, verification becomes a rear-view mirror: it surfaces issues after sourcing decisions are locked in and commercial consequences have already followed. Regulators are increasingly asking brands to provide credible evidence, not unverified documentation or assumptions about sourcing and supply chain flows.

 

 

6.     Building collaborative and programmatic approaches to risk

While risk cannot be eliminated entirely, progress is being made when brands and suppliers move from one-off, reactive interventions to program-based approaches with shared accountability. The panel explored how connected approaches, where parties work from the same evidence base and standardize what “good” looks like, enable earlier action and confidence that can scale across an ecosystem.

 

 

7.     Three drivers of change

The pressure on brands and suppliers was described as a triangle of legislative, legal, and moral drivers. Any one of them, or a combination, can prompt action but regulation in particular is proving to be the most powerful accelerator. In practice, that means operating models, evidence standards, and supplier engagement approaches now need to be built for enforcement, not just reporting.

 

 

Want to continue the conversation? If you’re a brand, retailer, or supplier looking to move from intent to implementation, Oritain’s Membership Program provides a practical pathway, with a tiered, science-based model to strengthen traceability, reduce risk, and build credibility with buyers and buying teams, regulators, and stakeholders. Contact us to schedule a conversation with our team.