🛒 The Check-Out: Joseph Mountain, N Brown Group & Future Fashion Fair
building circular fashion ecosystems + good news + how to write an impact report!
This week there are two friends featured in this newsletter, and one helped me meet the other. Almost 4 years ago, George (Zevero) introduced me to a very passionate Manchester student called Joe (in today’s hot seat). Joe had just started the Future Fashion Fair - carving his path and cultivating the Manchester sustainable fashion scene in the process.
Eagle eyes at our Patagonia x Following the Footprints 4 year birthday bonanza in February, in Manchester, would’ve seen Joe and I reunite - this time in person! He’s now leading sustainability at N Brown Group, and the Future Fashion Fair has grown and grown since we first met. Wow how time flies. I feel old.
As usual - a chunky roundup of this week’s Good(s) News and a reminder of one of our most recent AND most popular articles-that-you-may-have-missed at the end.
Let’s dig in…
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6 questions with Joseph Mountain, Sustainability Manager at N Brown Group & Founder of Future Fashion Fair.
Hello! We’d love the non-LinkedIn lowdown on who you are and the scope of your work at N Brown Group?
I’m Joseph (Joe) Mountain, Sustainability Manager at N Brown Group, a UK digital retailer that owns brands such as JD Williams, Simply Be, and Jacamo. My role is primarily focused on product and supply chain sustainability, drawing on my background in fabric development and textile innovation. But it’s broader than that, I also work on ethical compliance, ESG strategy, reporting, and risk… all the fun stuff!
If I had to define myself, my job would probably be a big part of it (sadly), as I’m slightly obsessed with making fashion more sustainable, and I’m not joking.
That said, I do have a life outside of work. Cooking food is my happy place, a good glass of wine, and running. I’m the youngest of five boys, grew up with just as many dogs, and was surrounded by the Yorkshire countryside, so being outdoors and playing sports has always been a big part of who I am. I also have a love-hate relationship with Manchester United (controversial for a Yorkshireman), which takes up more brain space than I’d like to admit. But above all, I value spending quality time laughing, loving, and making memories with my friends, family, and partner.
Talk to us about your work at N Brown Group - what are you working on at the moment? Any challenges that are particularly hard to chew? Our readers might be able to help….
At the moment, like most brands, it’s digging into the mess of Scope 3 emissions, taking off the lid and getting to grips with what’s inside. We were a bit late to the party as a business, I started 3 years ago with some degree of a blank canvas, so we’re playing catch-up, which means working at speed is critical!
We built our ESG strategy to align with the Paris Agreement, mapped our biggest impacts against planetary boundaries and made sure our commitments lined up with the UN SDGs. But in fashion, nothing moves without supplier engagement, and we need that now.
When we did our scenario analysis, which informed our transition plan, it showed (no surprise) that the biggest emissions sit within supply chain renewables. And that’s the real messy, expensive, long-game stuff we have to tackle. It’s not something you can fix quickly or cheaply.
So while we’re working on that, we’ve been going after the low-hanging fruit, yes, we’re making material transitions to lower-impact fibres, running circular design workshops, and trialling circular business models. That kind of ‘run’ work can be done with some pace, but to fully integrate you have to be pragmatic, because if the business itself isn’t financially sustainable, then the environmental impact doesn’t get a chance to land. The market is challenging at the best of times, now we are seeing big retailers make cuts, sustainability can't be fulfilled without resources, and just like life, requires a balance.
One thing I’m really proud of though is our zero-waste packaging. We developed a dissolvable polymer (kind of like a dishwasher tablet) for the polybags that our products get delivered in, which breaks down in about 30 days in the environment, or instantly in hot water. It was a huge win for us, and we were the first large UK retailer to roll out something this technical at scale across global operations.
I’ve definitely learned a lot (often the hard way), but honestly, I’m not disheartened. It’s just a challenge that needs proper problem-solving. And if that’s your thing, weirdly, it becomes part of the fun.
You’ve also set up a Manchester-based event series called Future Fashion Fair during your time at the University of Leeds, which is still running. Tell us about the vision there, and how readers can get involved!
I think like most young enthusiastic people wanting to make a difference and make their mark, you say yes to everything, even if you do not have the time and have no idea what you are getting yourself into… Future Fashion Fair started as a way to bring sustainable fashion markets, events, and pop-ups to Manchester and to be honest it was exciting and also slightly chaotic but that’s what made it all the more fun. In 2022, we became a CIC and evolved our focus towards supporting and promoting what we call "Localised Circular Fashion Ecosystems." These ecosystems connect key elements of the product lifecycle, businesses, events, designers, and communities, to build an ‘infrastructure’ that supports circularity in Greater Manchester.
Our goal is to make these ecosystems accessible, adaptable, and appealing (the three A’s!). Without these, circular fashion struggles to gain traction, something we see across the industry today. But when built with the right energy, creativity, and collective spirit, place-based circular systems can truly thrive.
A big focus for us has been swap shops, not just their role in reducing fashion waste, but also their social impact. So, we created a toolkit to help others set them up in their own communities. We also host workshops on how to launch swap shops and run our own to support their growth in community hubs like schools, churches, and local centres.
Ok, magic wand time; if we could grant you three wishes for the fashion industry, what would they be?
Press the Reset Button - Let’s be honest, the fashion industry is fundamentally broken from both a social and environmental perspective. It’s not fit for the future, and trying to retrofit it feels like a losing battle. We’re in 2025, and we’re producing, consuming, and wasting more than ever. This wasn’t the plan but let's face it, brands / retailers were not going to stop without the legislation and that's also taking too long, because well… just like anything legal, it's complicated. Let me just press a reset button and brands could choose how rebuild with the scenarios laid out in front of them.
Make Sustainability Fun Again (Personal Rant Pending) - Selfishly, I just want sustainability to be fun again. Governance, measuring, and tracking are all important, but right now, risk management dominates everything and ironically that’s a huge risk... Words are cheap, and if brands are spending most of the time not actually doing the do, what’s the point?
The unfortunate reality is that people have figured out how to make money off the reporting, standards, and governance structures, which means the more time we spend figuring this out, the more they profit. Meanwhile, the actual work that reduces impact gets deprioritised. That needs to change.Conscious Consuming - I’d love for people to consume fashion with purpose. It’s something I talk about a lot on our Substack, Responsible Planet (shameless plug!), but it’s something I deeply believe in.
In many ways, consumers already purchase with conviction, based on occasion, price, and style but we need to go deeper! Not just thinking about sustainability in the traditional sense (materials, recycled content, etc.), I actually don’t think it’s fair to place the responsibility of “sustainable shopping” on customers, brands should be held accountable for that.But what we can do is encourage people to engage more with their clothes, to buy less and invest more. Not just financially, but emotionally. When people buy with more intention, they actually spend less in the long run, choose better-quality pieces, and wear them more. Culturally, I think society has to evolve this way to align with future scenarios, but this shift could transform the fashion industry into a healthier market, one where customers have better options, better quality, and more meaningful relationships with their clothes.
And if I can’t have this as a wish? Well, I’ll make it my mission to push this idea further!
Finally - we’d love some recommendations; one climate-related resource, one person to follow online and one consumer brand that’s killing it!
🔎 Resource: In my world, it’s WRAP (Textile 2030) and UKFT, feeding high-quality research into everything textile and fashion-related. From circular design, durability, wet processing, and textile sorting, they’re leading the charge to deliver a sustainable UK fashion market. Loads of great resources on both sites.
💙 Brand(s): Both as a brand and an online figure, front.office.co is next level—an Australian brand focused on research and development, taking product concept, storytelling, and referencing to a whole other level. They share great content on the history of fabrics, garments, and styles (if you're into that kind of thing, of course). Also, Story MFG - I didn’t have to think hard about this at all. Yes, I know it’s luxury and costly, but in my view, worth every buck! I just love the clothing stories, the craftsmanship, the references, and the process through weaving, dyeing, and manufacturing. It's a joy to witness a brand grow so organically and do it right from day one. Finally, another personal favourite of mine is @_we_love_you__ - very wholesome.
👋 Person: @seth.hughes for thought-provoking storytelling on how to be more connected with nature.
Huge thanks to Joseph for joining us today, and taking the time to answer our questions! Have thoughts? Reach out to him…
🎯 Skin Formulas, the Irish skincare brand, announced they are B Corp certified.
🎯 SURI released its 2024 impact report. Milestones included collecting half a tonne of used toothbrush heads for recycling and reducing Scope 3 emissions per unit by 17.7%. The brand is also working with Greenly on its carbon reduction strategy, looking to prioritize insetting emissions.
🎯 Ollie Dog Food partnered with rePurpose Global to remove 37,500 pounds of plastic waste during Earth Month. This is part of their goal to reduce the environmental impact of their operations.
🎯 Lawson's Finest Liquids released its 2024 Impact Report, celebrating over $2.5 million donated to 399 nonprofits since the inception of its Social Impact Program and reducing resource use across all categories, including achieving a 97.2% waste diversion rate at their Vermont-based brewery.
⭐️ Cotopaxi released its 2024 Impact Report, highlighting its achievement of using only recycled, repurposed, or certified materials for all core fabrics and expanding its Guaranteed for Good™ program to repair nearly half of returned products. The brand recommitted and progressed its science-based targets with the goal of 42% reduction in Scope 1+2 emissions by 2030 and 90% reduction in Scope 3 by 2045.
Follow us on LinkedIn for a fresh digest of Good News every Friday. Have good news? Share it with us - info@followingthefootprints.com!
> Finally, in case you missed it…
🌱 How to write an impact report that people will actually read
Not only are we approaching the end of April, but for many companies we are also approaching the end of the financial year. For sustainability consultants (and maybe accountants too, lol) this can be a busy time. I’m thinking annual carbon footprinting, taking stock of the annual sustainability targets, updating scorecards and, of course, impact reporti…
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Team FTF