Timberland Company

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Timberland Company is an American based retailer and manufacturer of outdoor wear that focuses on footwear. Timberland has branches in different locations, including Canada, the USA, Italy, Germany, and the United Kingdom, among other countries. Timberland operates in the market, involving sales of apparel watch leather boots, clothes, and sunglasses. VF Corporation owns Timberland. The office headquarters are found in Stratham, New Hampshire USA. Timberland operates in the global market and has been a leading international company. The integration of sustainable development strategies in all Timberland company business operations has made it competitive in the market share. Considering the company sustainability profiles in three chosen states of services, the following are key drivers that have motivated the company to mainstream the idea of a sustainable business approach. In recap, the company values have driven the management and timberland company staff to get bound on the key objectives that focus on buying a product that is valuing everyone and have sustainable concepts included. The desire to engage proactively with external groups has made the company partner with NGOs, other states, and climate oriented groups in the promotion of sustainability. Senior management persons have priorities of integrating sustainability into the global business. Additionally, environmental action leadership groups have positively motivated Timberland to focus on sustainability, e.g., green space. Involvement in community work like tree planting as well as a ready market for sustainable products has also been key factors that motivate Timberland to increase the sustainability level in all areas of operations.

INTRODUCTION 

The global organization and their sustainability journey 

Timberland Corporation has a long journey and history that anyone could feel anxious to know about. Timberland started in 1928 by Nathan Swartz in Massachusetts in Boston, US. Little did the founder know that the company needed a sustainable strategy to attract many customers. The first sustainable activity took place in 1989 when Timberland partnered with city year Inc., a youth group based in Boston to support the community through urban Peace, Corps programs. Timberland offered 10 million dollars help to the community in 13 cities of the US. Sustainability journey continued were in 1992, Timberland launched a community service (give the racism the boot) focusing on creating a community integrated with sustainability, and little cases of racism were recorded. In the year 1997, Timberland made an increment of employees’ employees’ payments of benefits to 40 hours. In 2006 Timberland showed an increase of environmental protection through setting new standards on product transparency. Timberland came up with the original packaging of footwear with a nutritional label that contained information on the commitment of the company towards the reduction of its environmental footprints. In Ontario, California, Timberland Company unveiled a solar panel installation, which contributed to a 69% reduction of greenhouse gases emission. Due to the companies continued the effort to fight sustainability, 2010, the company was ranked second on climate count, which made it battle for climate change in the world aggressively.

Recently Timberland has the goal of planting fifty million trees over the next five years. To achieve the 50 million trees dream, Timberland will partner with organizations such as the American Forest in the campaign. They are producing 100% of footwear with components of renewable content on organic and recyclable material. Additionally, the company has satisfied the natural recycled sustainably sourced of the cotton for its apparel. The consider outsourcing from farmers who use fewer pesticides.

In 2017, Timberland footwear shipped goods containing contained PVC and PFC. Currently, Timberland has come with an alternative to upgrading this. Lastly, in packaging, Timberland uses recycled materials and water-based Inc. that have been used for an extended period(Gandhi, 2017).

Generally, Timberland has several far-reaching and extensive sustainability initiatives that have worked for corporates social responsibilities. The workers have been given paid leaves to participate in community work and urban greening commitments.

Timberland has unwavering commitments to social and environmental responsibility. Timberland is an outdoor lifestyle brand motivated by its involvement in operations and innovative operations in terms of products in the global market. Timberland focuses on meaningful environmental targets creation for the whole line.

LEADERSHIP & STRATEGY  

Corporate Leadership and Strategy 

Timberland has an approach to sustainability. Having responsible leadership and management, the company has several programs aimed at increasing sustainability. Through the direction, Timberland reports on its financial performance and sustainability actions undertaken by the company. The management effort is in support of the employee service and critical social responsibility development that respects the global CSR. Through this approach, Timberland has been able to attract the attention of NGOs that leads to environmental protection matters. Leadership approaches also have paved ways for the company to get interested in related groups that are currently addressing the challenge of sustainability. For example, Timberland was able to work with Ceres in its mission of integrating sustainability into business practices for the health of people and planet

Corporates’  social responsibility reports have been alerting the public on Timberland organizations, social and environmental impacts, and the efforts towards improving such situations. Through better leadership, Timberland has been accountable for leading in ecological and social impact solutions toward sustainability. The leadership approach has made the company to be able to share its social environmental and product attributes by messaging and product information.

Through the leadership approach, Timberland Company has come up with a green index that is aimed at giving smooth and precise information to consumers on their footwear choice. Currently, the company leadership is focused on a goal in reducing climate change by the use of renewable energy, sustainable supply chain, and GHG inventory. On products category, we have chemicals, leather, raw materials, and green index that are environmentally friendly

Moreover, in factories, the leadership has ensured that the factory conditions are better and ecologically fit. The use of environmental performance scores and responsible sourcing are also drivers towards sustainability. The leadership approach has ensured that the rate of hours served is sustainable.

The company has taken the following measures to drive sustainability in the company. Timberland uses materials requiring less water, land, and few chemicals in production (Gandhi, 2017). This is an action known as sustainable resource consumption. The leadership developed strategies that govern the production process to ensure that there is little emission of greenhouse gases at the time of footwear production. The Timberland CSR is made of dedicated employees who are leading the company in actively planting trees in the community development programs.

Describe and explain what types of strategies and policies the organization has adopted to drive sustainability in the organization.

Timberland has set policies towards making the world better by dedicating to sustainable products Timberland has set strategies on being an innovative company that leads in coming up with new product packages to cater for the needs of the community. For example, adding a nutritional label on the boot is a sign of innovation. The company is dedicated to making greening initiatives. Employing this strategy will change nature. Activities like planting 50 million trees on the planet are a goal to boost the environment.  According to Lubber  (2017), Sustainable service to the community Timberland employees and management have actively participated in the creation of awareness on sustainable community development campaigning for a safer planet and people. Timberland Company has an initiative like planting the change, which contributes towards reducing global warming. However, slogans like every day are earth day by Timberland Company is an approach that sensitizes on increasing tree covers the same as nature needs heroes. The urban greening strategy helps to improve the urban community sustainably.

 HOW DOES THE COMPANY DO SUSTAINABILITY

Energy Management Systems; Operations & Reporting

Timberland has developed an energy management system solution that enhances the organizations’ commitment to sustainable practices. To do so, Timberland has developed a better implementation towards the reduction of energy cost during outsourcing n production of footwear. Additionally, through the use of iso50001 standards, Timberland has established a framework for energy supply, energy use, and consumption in the industrial institutional and commercial levels. Furthermore, this helps in reducing environmental impact and global warming.

Employee Engagement & Recognition

Timberland organizations have been leading by engaging their employees in community services based on sustainability concepts. The employees are given paid leave to serve, empower, and motivate the community towards sustainable development activities. However, Timberland organizations provide incentives to the committed workers in sustainable programs and innovations, which include; work promotion, and salary increment. Recently, the company increased the employees’ employees’ benefits to 40 hours

Sustainability: Energy Management Systems; Operations & Reporting 

Recycling and reusing Timberland used products. To lower the global warming and climate change, this company has come up with a sustainable approach to cater to people, planet, and profits. Reusing the old products in the production of new ones is an eco-friendly notion that prioritizes the law, culture, and sustainability. They are recycling old plastic bottles to use in thread making. The integration of sustainable business strategy has resulted in innovation and technological advancement in the business plan. For example, using old bottles to make shoe threads bring sustainability. The business balances the need for economic growth by actively protecting the environment, inclusion, or removal of carbon footprints on toxic substances. Timberland has considered the needs of an evolving society by setting environmentally aligned projects. A good steward on lowering toxic emissions in manufacturing processes. During the manufacturing process, Timberland has integrated energy system management that focuses on reducing greenhouse gas emission, as explained above in iso5001 standards.

Describe and explain what is captured (or not captured) under the Energy Management System Reporting  

In Timberland CSR reporting, the energy management systems highlight waste production reports and waste control. Additionally, water consumption and efficiencies use is given in reports. The company has set measures and policies that guide its operations in the production process to the market. The report on Timberland shoe company social responsibility is given every quarter in any financial year.

What type of reporting standards?  

Timberland Shoe Company CSR reporting is done following the measures set globally for any global business organization, which has enabled the company to work towards its set objectives and missions to achieve the set global standards during reporting. Efficiency and transparency of the data provided are supported by backup information containing all companies’ business operations and activities in a specified quarter. This is a guarantee that the data provided is correct for reference in future reports.

Sustainability: Employee Engagement & Recognition   

Employees in Timberland Company are committedly driven by several factors to work towards sustainability. The senior management personnel have priorities of integrating sustainability in the business operations. The big management decisions and preferences highly motivate the employees from different sectors such as outsourcing, supply chain production, and sales department. Employees, therefore, make use of the set business preferences and strategies by the management to increase their capacities of making themselves more sustainable business-oriented (Mei, 2019).  .

The timberland company shows a desire to engage proactively in environmental protection and programs aimed at improving business marketing strategies. The employees, therefore, are motivated towards making use of sustainable marketing initiatives. All over three countries of operations, the USA, Canada, and Italy, employees show involvement in company ‘company’s sustainable projects.

From the above analysis, we can deduce that employees play an essential role in organizations’ business performance, thus creating a sense of a sustainable planet, people, and making profits.

Describe and explain what types of recognition the organization has received and how that supports employee engagement

Timberland organization was recently recognized as a leader in fostering and fighting against climate change. Timberland does so through ongoing the goal of planting the 50 million trees. Timberland also focuses on involving the employees in working as ambassadors of change in the community development programs. Recently Timberland was ranked second in fighting and mitigating climate change (Seo, 2017).

DESCRIBE AND EXPLAIN ANY FUTURE ENGAGEMENT PLANS

Timberland organizations have future sustainability plans. The business balances the need for economic growth with the active protection of the environment, including removal of the carbon footprints of the toxic substances. In future expectations, Timberland is a sustainable company that works on the notion of making profits, expanding to new markets. It remains a good environmental steward through lowering toxic emissions, right from production to marketing of the footwear products. The company has partnered with sustainable brands to make improvement of society and nature, which means that in future there is a likelihood of meeting the interest of new partners to the business (Manzi,2016).

MARKETING: SUSTAINABILITY

Discuss and examine the alignment of the marketing with corporate strategy 

Timberland is using its global tree planting projects as an opportunity to discuss the organizations long term sustainable strategies. Timberland hopes to strengthen the brand’s perception among the consumers. This is a bid for playing an essential role in creating a sustainable future. In the marketing week, Timberland launched a tree-planting project accompanied by a campaigning nature needs heroes to generate interest of consumers to the brand.

Sustainability message in the Timberland brand has attracted many consumers since it uses sustainable materials and sustainable production ways. In marketing, the company has done a prerequisite visit to different parts of the world campaigning for its brand before launching a new brand. To attract many customers, the company has done the SWOT analysis to understand its areas of strength, weaknesses, opportunities in the market, and threats (Gandhi, 2017).

Consequently, the SWOT analysis has enabled the company to identify its areas of strength and opportunities in the market (Mei, 2019).  Timberland utilizes the current opportunities and strength of the company to meet the sustainable company strategy to stay leading in the global market. On the other hand, Timberland makes use of its weaknesses and threats in the market to set plans and strategies for improving its future business competitive advantage.

What are your perspectives and views on the company marketing approach? 

Timberland’s organization, marketing strategy, is one of the best to win the attention of many customers. The idea if integrating a sustainable concept in marketing is an opportunity. Since many people are looking to buy products that have less impact on the environment. According to my understanding, Timberland is using the best marketing strategy (Hatfield & Madore, 2017).  However, it could be advisable if the company increases the sustainable activities and programs to the community.

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION

The integration of sustainability in business is associated with many opportunities. In the case study, in every country of operation listed, Timberland Company respects the government policies before the launch of any marketing campaigns. In the global market, Timberland is getting more famous for being an innovative and community development agent. In Timberland’s business operations, the management takes care of the globe and human beings as it makes profits. Despite competition from other brands like Nike, Timberland is leading in environmental concern, e.g., planting 50 million trees on the planet. Plans for the company are; disclosing of packaging and labeling details having ecological impacts of chemicals and organic materials in the Timberland products. Timberland promotes fair labor practices and human rights when dealing with the supplier. The company’ company’s culture, social responsibility, and justice have made the company successful for some years. Generally, the efforts of the company to be sustainable in every of its product over the decade has been a motive to eco-efficiency and eco-effectiveness as discussed above. The due increase I the global issues, there is likely hood of the establishment of new companies with the same type of the products produced by Timberland Company. This could be a future constraint in the market. Even the current footwear competitors could copy the timberland marketing strategy and compete in the market. The next generations will have a focus on sustainability. Everyone will need an environmentally friendly product. This creates a better opportunity for this company in the future.