Marimekko has strong values, which we call the Marimekko Spirit. One of our values, “fairness to everyone and everything” crystalizes our sustainability thinking and extends to our own personnel and our customers, as well as our partners around the world – for example, to workers who manufacture Marimekko products.
We are committed to respecting human rights in all our operations. Our approach to human rights is based on the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs). According to them, in addition that the governments have the obligation to protect human rights, companies have a responsibility to respect human rights and to avoid impacting human rights negatively in all their operations.
Our due diligence approach for human rights is based on careful supplier assessment and selection as well as contractual obligations imposed on partner suppliers. All of our partner suppliers must commit to complying with Marimekko’s Supplier Code of Conduct. This Code of Conduct defines, among other things, respect for human rights, such as strict principles against child and forced labour, as well as freedom of association and to equal treatment. The Supplier Code of Conduct applies to all Marimekko suppliers, their subcontractors and third parties acting on behalf of the supplier, regardless of where they are located. The Supplier Code of Conduct can be found on under our Guiding principles page.
Marimekko is a member of the European amfori BSCI initiative, which provides tools for monitoring and improving working conditions in global supply chains. Purchase agreements with our partner suppliers bind our manufacturers to comply with Marimekko’s Supplier Code of Conduct. Marimekko’s Supplier Code of Conduct is based on the amfori BSCI Code of Conduct, which in turn is based on key international principles on human rights and labour rights, such as the UN Declaration of Human Rights, the International Labour Organization (ILO) conventions, the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises, and the UN Principles on the Rights of the Child, which guide business operations. By signing the Supplier Code of Conduct, contract manufacturers commit to complying with the principles described in the Code and taking adequate measures to ensure that they are also complied with throughout their supply chain.
We monitor compliance with the Supplier Code of Conduct and other requirements, for example, in connection with our own factory visits. In addition, we carry out third-party factory audits, mainly in countries outside the EU, which are classified as higher-risk countries.
Third-party audits are mandatory for our contract manufacturers outside the EU in higher-risk countries. In 2024, a total of 100 percent of our products sourced from outside the EU were subject to social audits. Of these, 83 percent were covered by amfori BSCI audits and the rest by other similar social audits, such as SA8000 or SMETA.
In 2024, a total of 33 amfori BSCI audits of social responsibility were carried out at our partner suppliers’ factories. Almost without exception, the audits identify areas for development, which is typical in production activities in the textile industry. The observations made in the audits were reviewed with the factories and, if necessary, plans for corrective actions were drawn up. You can read more about the results of the audits and corrective actions in Marimekko’s Year 2024. Marimekko will monitor the implementation of the remaining measures and in future audits in accordance with the amfori BSCI audit cycle.
Continuous development of procedures to identify human rights risks
We recognize that the risks of human rights violations in their supply chain extend from the suppliers with whom we have a business relationship, further, to raw material producers. We continuously develop our processes for assessing human rights impacts and risks, mitigating negative human rights impacts and, if identified, addressing these impacts. In the long term we aim at full transparency of our operations and supply chain, starting with raw materials.
Children’s rights are important to us, and we do not accept the use of child labor. We recognize that, for example, in certain cotton farming areas there is a risk for the use of child or forced labor. For this reason, at the beginning of 2025, we joined the working group of The Centre for Child Rights and Business, within which member companies can share information and best practices for taking children’s rights and human rights into account in their business. We do not accept materials, in particular cotton, from very high-risk areas.
The amfori BSCI Code of Conduct and our Supplier Code of Conduct both include the principle of fair remuneration, sufficient to provide workers with a decent living and meet their and their family’s basic needs. The legal minimum wages set by various countries or wages based on collective agreements are sometimes not enough to meet this requirement. We at Marimekko are committed to promoting a living wage for the workers in our supply chain. As the issue is multifaceted and involves a range of stakeholders from businesses to legislators and local unions or other worker representatives, we believe that the best way to advance the objective is through collaboration. As a member of the amfori BSCI, we support their initiatives aimed at promoting the realization of living wages in supply chains. Read more about amfori BSCI’s approach.
It is challenging to ensure that human rights are fully respected through our value chain, but we are determinedly and persistently working on the transparency of our sourcing and on developing the production conditions together with our suppliers.
All documents related to our sourcing, such as a list of our partner suppliers, Supplier Code of Conduct and Sustainability Policy, you can find on the guiding principles page.