PARIS — Coach parent Tapestry is strengthening its partnership with recycled leather fiber manufacturer Gen Phoenix, signing a three-year purchase agreement for its proprietary recycled leather material.
In the first big move, the legacy leather goods brand will launch a new line of Coach Classic bags, set to debut later this year and roll out wide in 2026, produced using Gen Phoenix’s fully-coated recycled leather material.
The companies first joined forces two years ago, when Tapestry participated in an $18 million funding round for the U.K.-based Gen Phoenix in March 2023. Coach then debuted its Coachtopia circular subbrand of handbags featuring an uncoated lining from Gen Phoenix’s recycled leather fiber material that April.
“What our partnership has done is allowed us to take our leather expertise, our understanding of the consumer and luxury, and add that to what Gen Phoenix does [in] sustainable, more industrial products. Taking this concept of going from airplane seats to luxury handbags is what our partnership created,” Coach chief executive officer Todd Kahn told WWD.
Gen Phoenix has long produced recycled leather for mass transportation, such as seating in buses and planes made from unfinished scraps left over during the tanning process. “It started with Coachtopia, and we see a lot of applications over the years on using this new material as part of Coach’s future,” Kahn said.
The newest technology can recycle the leather scrap waste to create a new fully-coated material. Tapestry has committed to buying 40 million square feet of the new material over the next three years. Gen Phoenix’s facility in the U.K. can produce up to 64.5 million square feet a year.
The partnership “was about elevating it into a luxury good,” said Gen Phoenix chief marketing officer Elyse Winer.
“We’ve actually been truly integrated as one team, thinking about how can we take this material and add the body, the hand-feel, and the look to make sure that the luxury Coach consumer does not have to compromise for a more sustainable product,” she said.
A Coach backpack using Gen Phoenix recycled leather material.
Courtesy Coach and Gen Phoenix
Bags using the new Gen Phoenix material will retail at a comparable price point to other Coach products, Kahn said.
“The green premium is a fiction, and people want it, but they don’t want to pay more for it,” he acknowledged.
As the partnership grows, Coach is also exploring additional trademark concepts to highlight the Gen Phoenix material and amplify the brand’s sustainable credentials.
“You know, if a tree falls in the forest and no one’s around to hear, it doesn’t make a sound. So, we want to make a big sound — to call it out and really explain and market and storytell around the attributes of the product for the consumer — at the right time,” Kahn said. Gen Phoenix material will also be integrated throughout other collections.
“What we’re trying to accomplish is something at scale, not a niche idea…We knew through our own consumer insight and research that the consumer loves sustainability [but] to put a big premium on it will not create anything at scale, which is what’s so important to us,” said Kahn.
“This is why we were so aligned with Coach, this idea of making more of what we have and finding beauty in waste,” added Winer.
Leather scraps at Gen Phoenix’s facility.
Courtesy Gen Phoenix
The partnership was unveiled Thursday at CES in Las Vegas, as part of the electronics fair’s first dedicated fashion track. Winer argued that having fashion front and center at CES is a powerful statement on how fashion can lead the way in sustainability through partnerships with legacy brands and start-ups.
“Sustainability only matters at scale. You know, you can do a pilot or a capsule collection, but you’re not going to make meaningful headway towards your sustainability commitments or towards combating climate change with just a few units of product,” said Winer. “It’s not just about a material. It’s about, in the case of Coach and Coachtopia, rethinking the supply chain, rethinking the way products are designed, rethinking what we do with waste at the end of its life.”
Coach will also contribute goods from its in-house (Re)Loved exchange program into Gen Phoenix’s supply chain to make that program fully circular.
Other Tapestry brands Kate Spade and Stuart Weitzman may use the Gen Phoenix material in the future, and it will be made available to other companies as well at a later date.
“Our hope and goal is that the concept takes off and becomes an industry standard,” Kahn said.
