Trust, honesty and respect. – These values guide us in our daily dealings with our employees and customers. They apply not only to us, but also to our business partners and producers, both inside and outside Germany.
We believe it is our responsibility to ensure fair working conditions throughout the supply chain. In order to guarantee this, we have created the LOWA Code of Conduct, which sets out our ethical, environmental and social standards. These standards apply to our production site in Germany as well as to both our own and third-party production facilities in other countries. Here too, we expect our standards of conduct to be rigorously upheld.
LOWA accepts a company as a business partner only if it pledges to observe the social, environmental and governance standards set out in the LOWA Code of Conduct and commits to the Code in writing.
LOWA requires its business partners and producers to sign the LOWA Code of Conduct (CoC), which is based on international standards such as the principles of the UN Global Compact, the ILO (International Labour Organisation) Core Labour Standards and the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.
The CoC governs environmental matters as well as occupational health and safety.
Of course, it also covers working hours and wages, overtime, bonuses and extra pay, dismissal protection, paid sick leave and maternity leave.
Other key matters covered by our CoC include anti-discrimination, prevention of bribery and corruption, the right to organise and freedom of association, the right to join a union and a ban on child labour, forced labour and disciplinary measures.
The Code of Conduct is communicated to all employees in their respective national languages. In addition, the content of the Code is communicated in the form of notices displayed at the sites and, if need be, in training sessions.
Free bus routes to the workplace for LOWA employees
We ensure that our LOWA Code of Conduct is upheld by conducting regular internal audits. On-site visits at the production sites are carried out at least once every two years.
In 2022, we went a step further and brought in additional third-party audits of our sites. The support provided by independent auditors not only serves the purposes of review and transparency – its primary purpose is to help identify and exploit development potential together with our production partners.
While touring the company’s factories, the auditors gain an impression of general working conditions and safety-relevant aspects. They examine a range of documents, including payslips and contracts, talk with managers and interview individual employees. LOWA makes sure that at least one of the auditors speaks the language of the country where the facility is located.
Since the beginning of 2023, LOWA has been a member of the Fair Wear Foundation, an internationally active, independent non-profit organisation based in Amsterdam. The Fair Wear Foundation works with manufacturers and companies from the textile and footwear industry to improve working conditions along the entire supply chain.
Through membership, we commit to fair and responsible production processes along our entire supply chain and to their continuous improvement. The Fair Wear Foundation gives us clear guidelines regarding working and production conditions in our own factories and those of our production partners. The results are published in so-called Brand Performance Checks.
LOWA assumes that all its employees and business partners will act in an upright and correct manner. However, we realise that violations of legal regulations and/or the guidelines contained in our Code of Conduct may still occasionally occur. For this reason, we encourage all employees and business partners to communicate any concerns they may have,
Tel.: +49 800 3800 999
Tel.: +49 69 9999 8838
Legal Ombudsperson:
Karin Holloch
Rechtsanwältin
Achenbachstraße 8
D-40237 Düsseldorf (Germany)
Tel.: +49 211 540 11 330
E-Mail: karin.holloch@business-integrity.lawyer
We encourage staff to lodge a complaint or provide a tip-off in the even that they become aware of any violations of the Code of Conduct. LOWA will take each tip-off seriously and pursue it. It will also protect the whistleblower. Business partners are likewise not permitted to take any disciplinary action against an employee for whistleblowing.
The audit results are documented and presented in a closing discussion. Any violations will be recorded in a corrective action plan and a report. They must be rectified within a reasonable amount of time. We do our best to support our business partners and producers in this process. We view the implementation of the Code of Conduct as a joint, cooperative responsibility aimed at safeguarding fair working conditions along the supply chain.
If serious violations of the CoC occur and are not corrected despite our assistance, LOWA retains the right to terminate the business relationship. However, all our current business relationships have existed for at least five years, and most of them have been in place for 10 years or more.