WE’RE NOT A SUSTAINABLE COMPANY & WE DON’T MAKE SUSTAINABLE FOOTWEAR. YET… 

Disrupting the status quo and challenging the mainstream has always been the Vivobarefoot way. We started with making barefoot footwear in a world that is cushioned and sedentary. Now, we’re trying to build a responsible business in an industry infamous for exploitation, extraction, short-termism, and waste.


We don’t make sustainable footwear yet. But we’re working hard to make that a reality, and then go one step further.  


If sustainability is the idea that we can ignore past damage and just do no further harm, then we don’t think that goes far enough. We have our sights set on regeneration; restoring and renewing natural and social systems through the way we do business.  


That’s why we anchor everything we do in 3 pillars:  

  • 01. REGENERATIVE BUSINESS

    We commit to building a healthy, profitable, fiercely independent business that delivers a net positive impact for people & planet. 

  • 02. REGENERATIVE PRODUCT

    We commit to developing products that are regenerative to feet, human movement and planetary health.  

  • 03. REGENERATIVE COMMUNITY

    We commit to bringing more people closer to nature and their natural potential through engagement, inspiring education and healthy connections.   

THE HUMAN FOOT IS NATURE’S MASTERPIECE

With 28 bones, hundreds of muscles, and thousands of nerve endings, your feet have been millions of years in the making. They are, by far, the cleverest things ever put into a shoe. Modern footwear – narrow, padded, rigid – cuts off their natural potential. Vivos, on the other foot, are wide, thin, and flexible to regenerate your feet and revitalise your natural movement. From circular design to material innovation and value-chain transparency, we’re working hard to develop products that will eventually regenerate planetary health too.

OUR PRODUCT GOALS

Seven product goals guide our footwear development. These include gaining 100% transparency over our value chain, circular design, ethical sourcing, using bio-based materials over synthetics where possible and – the big one - achieve true regenerative impact for all products we manufacture. We’re a long way off achieving them, but they signal the direction we’re heading in.

MORE ON MATERIALS

MATERIALS AND SUSTAINABILITY SCORING

There isn’t one global standard for measuring sustainable fashion and footwear products – so we’ve made our own. The V Matrix is our in-house tool for assessing the environmental impact of our footwear.

Developed in partnership with Made2Flow, it scores how complex and durable the product is, whether and what sustainable materials are used, how easy it is to repair, and the future recyclability of the product - giving one overall sustainability score for each style. A Vivo with organic cotton laces, natural materials in the upper, and a natural rubber outsole for example, would score higher than a product with unrecyclable virgin plastics. In time, we’d love to open source the V Matrix to other footwear brands. 

MORE ON THE VMATRIX

WE’RE IN THIS TOGETHER

Our community is growing bigger every day. Whether someone is an employee, an ambassador, a value chain partner or a customer, we want to empower everyone in our community to fulfil their potential and embrace a more human and natural way of living, working and everything in between.

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NURTURING INNOVATION

The Livebarefoot Fund (LBF) helps fund, initiate, and nurture projects we believe in – mostly social and environmental impact projects, but also innovation projects within the business. We provide time, energy, and resources to get good ideas off the ground and fully realised. We have big ambitions to scale the fund by unlocking additional funding each quarter, financial performance permitting.

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