Budweiser APAC, together with DOW and Vegatex, jointly developed and launched the world's first Barley-based Waterborne Garment Leather at the 2022 RISE UP Sustainable Fashion Challenge on October 14, 2022, and released the product during Spring and Summer 2023 Shanghai Fashion Week. 

Design by Ding Hanqing. Photo: Courtesy of Budweiser APAC

Organized by the R.I.S.E Sustainable Fashion Innovation Platform, the competition featured all 108 designers from seven countries and 52 top fashion art schools around the world. Linda Qian, Chief People Officer of Budweiser APAC, Jan Clysner, Vice President of Sustainability and Procurement of Budweiser APAC, and Konnie Zhu, Vice President of corporate Affairs of Budweiser China were all invited to the event in Shanghai.

Left: Linda Qian, Chief  People Officer of Budweiser APAC. Middle: Jan Clysner, Vice President of Sustainability and Procurement of Budweiser APAC. Right: Konnie Zhu, Vice President of corporate Affairs of Budweiser China attended the event. Photo: Courtesy of Budweiser APAC

Budweiser China Innovation Hub has been focusing on and supporting the innovation and growth of Vegatex since the start of this cooperation in 2021. The "Barley-based Waterborne Garment Leather" launched at Shanghai Fashion Week is mainly made from Budweiser China's brewer spent grain. We managed to replace traditional petroleum-based chemicals with our spent grain, and all the materials and production techniques applied are 100 percent pollution-free, odorless, and VOC certified.

Budweiser China Innovation Hub, as a pioneer in sustainability, was launched by Budweiser China in 2020 to promote sustainable innovation in the value chain from the dimensions of social responsibility, meeting consumer demand for sustainable products, optimizing processes in various business segments, and enhancing market value. The project aims to continually empower the industry's sustainable development and carbon neutral transformation, connect more innovators in sustainable development, and embed innovation culture and results throughout the value chain. The innovation competition through the Impact Hub Shanghai, aims to continuously discover and expand new technologies and explore for a sustainable future. Vegatex is the startup that graduated from its 2021 Innovation Competition.

"Sustainability is our business. We aim to create a sustainable future. As what we did today, we've created an industrialized plant-based leather, with equivalent or even higher quality as regular leather this year. And we will achieve more to influence more people tomorrow." Jan Clysner said.