ESG Mission and Vision
At Gap Inc., our mission is to be Inclusive, by Design, leveraging the scale of our business and the strength of our brands to empower women, enable opportunity and enrich communities. Our Global Sustainability team’s vision is to be a driving force in the industry, collectively building a more sustainable future for our business, global community, people and planet.
Our journey began with the values established by our founders, Doris and Don Fisher, who believed their business could create opportunities for the people and communities touched by Gap Inc. Today, our aim is to reimagine the way business can change the world.
Alignment with International Frameworks
Globally accepted frameworks such as the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, the Paris Agreement on climate change, and the Task Force on Climate-Related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) — help guide our sustainability strategy. We leverage sustainability-focused standards such as Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) and Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB) to communicate to investor and civil society audiences how our business impacts – and is impacted by – environmental, social, and governance issues.
Core Sustainability Focus Areas
We organize our sustainability goals and programs across three focus areas that comprise a compatible ecosystem:
- Empowering Women - Our business is driven by women – they are the majority of our customers, our leaders, our employees and our apparel supply chain – and we are making industry-leading investments to help ensure they are empowered to reach their full potential.
- Enabling Opportunity - Creating sustainable economies and a culture of equality and belonging means we use the assets and scale of our business to enable access to opportunity, particularly for historically marginalized individuals and communities.
- Enriching Communities - Gap Inc. is committed to protecting natural resources and ensuring healthy communities for generations to come. Our environmental targets are focused on building water resilience, reducing greenhouse gas emissions, eliminating unnecessary plastic waste, and supporting a circular economy.
Our Management Approach
We aim to create impact by following a four-part approach to all of our social and environmental programs:
- Integrate with our business: We integrate sustainability as part of our end-to-end business strategy, through the creation of our products and all of our operations. We create accountability by setting goals that are shared across the company and with relevant business units, and our ESG team is integrated into our brands and operations.
- Set ambitious goals: We have annual key progress indicators and long-term goals for the company in alignment with industry standards to drive our work forward and ensure accountability.
- Measure progress toward our commitments: We strive to always move forward in creating long-term, sustainable progress and delivering real benefits to the people and communities we rely on for our business, which also helps our company succeed. Our approach to data and measurement ensures we capture this progress and are able to report to our stakeholders transparently in alignment with reporting frameworks such as GRI and SASB.
- Form partnerships with civil society, governments and other sectors to increase collective impact: By partnering with organizations from the local to the global level, we fuel sustainable solutions, create greater equality and scale impact throughout our business, across our industry and beyond.
Governance
Gap Inc.’s robust governance structure ensures that we meet our social and environmental goals that support our business.
This starts with a commitment from our leadership, whose input and oversight help drive progress. It also includes our Board of Directors, whose independent perspective supports the success of our ESG efforts. The Board’s Governance and Sustainability Committee oversees our ESG activities and goals, including those related to climate and water.
The Board receives regular updates from our Chief Supply Chain, Strategy, and Transformation Officer, Sally Gilligan, and her leaders. As part of the senior leadership team, she meets regularly with leaders across the company, including from our Sourcing, Production, Brand and Operations teams.
Our organizational structure allows collaboration across key departments. Our Global Sustainability, brand Product and Marketing teams, as well as our Equality & Belonging, Human Resource, Supply Chain Strategy, Government Affairs, Legal and Gap Foundation teams work closely to achieve our goals.