Client Background and Challenge

Founded in 2000, Newby Teas is a UK-based luxury tea brand dedicated to climate responsibility, ethical sourcing, and traceability. With an emphasis on uncompromising quality, the company works to ensure fair pay, safer conditions for workers, and responsible farming across its own operations and those of its partners.

Newby reinforces its sustainable values with meaningful action: partnering with third-party certified tea gardens, disclosing suppliers through the Ethical Tea Partnership, investing in renewable energy, and achieving carbon neutrality at its preservation and packing center in Kolkata, India.

Eager to continue progress on its sustainability journey, the company sought support in building on its current momentum. While its team had submitted an EcoVadis assessment the previous year, disaggregated data, policies, and procedures—as well as limited resources—made achieving its goals a challenge. Newby sought a specialist that would work with its team of subject matter experts to strengthen its sustainability foundation—using the EcoVadis framework as guidance, architecture, and an indicator of growth.

Newby partnered with ADEC ESG with the goal of elevating its sustainability program, demonstrating a clear commitment to its customers, and setting itself apart from its peers on sustainability leadership. EcoVadis’ methodology is designed not only to give disclosing companies a score but to offer them a path forward. Improving EcoVadis performance means improving every aspect of a company’s approach to sustainability, from environment to human rights and across its policies, actions, and key results. Serving as an extension of Newby’s team, our goal was to effectively highlight the company’s growth and accomplishments through disclosure, as well as assist in developing a roadmap for the future of its sustainability journey.

Strategic Approach and Implementation

Newby Teas’ approach to sustainability is intentional and long-term. The company understands that sustainability management is an iterative process, with success built on year-over-year improvements, and 2025 represented the first stage of the continuous improvement process.

The primary goals of this initial stage included:

• Identifying and prioritizing potential areas for improvement in its existing sustainability program
• Beginning to unify the company around sustainability goals and policies
• Formalizing sustainability targets and measuring progress with KPIs
• Improving EcoVadis performance

To accomplish these goals, we began by:

• Performing a detailed gap analysis of its previous EcoVadis assessment
• Developing a program management roadmap to improve its score and better formalize its sustainability initiatives, policies, and processes
• Developing or expanding specific environmental, labor, ethics, and sustainable procurement policies
• Developing sustainability targets in line with EcoVadis criteria
• Identifying key performance indicators to measure progress against its newly set targets
• Completing Newby’s EcoVadis disclosure submission in full

Gap analysis and improvement roadmap

To establish a starting point, our team reviewed the client’s 2024 EcoVadis questionnaire submission and supporting documentation. This question-by-question analysis pinpointed areas for improvement, both within the submission and as a broader part of Newby’s sustainability management program. Generally, areas for improvement span a client’s sustainability policies, implemented actions, KPIs, and overall sustainability management.

With solid environmental and social policies and targets in place, Newby Teas shifted its focus toward implementation—turning this foundational work into a cohesive, long-term sustainability program that would empower the company to maintain momentum and achieve its targets.

To enable this progression, the results of the gap analysis served as a roadmap for Newby to start prioritizing initiatives, allocating resources, and engaging internal departments to address key areas in the short term, and planning for the long term. The roadmap gives Newby a clear structure to carry its work forward, providing cohesive direction and intentional next-steps in line with its goals.

Policy development

Building upon the results of the gap analysis, we collaborated closely with Newby’s team to prioritize policies and procedures to create or improve. These new and improved policies focused on creating clear objectives, ambitious but realistic commitments, and governance mechanisms across the organization, as well as setting a high standard for its suppliers and sourcing partners. We also worked with Newby to expand the scope of some policies to encompass both UK and India facilities, allowing for a more unified approach to sustainability governance.

Once finalized, the policies addressed topics such as sustainability procurement, anti-corruption, emissions, energy, and human rights and fair labor practices. Policies were also created with local context in mind, tailored specifically to include applicable UK and India regulations and policies.

Sustainability target development

Our team supported Newby Teas in the development of measurable sustainability targets aligned with recognized global frameworks (e.g. Science-Based Targets initiative, UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, etc.) and were designed to address EcoVadis scoring gaps across key EcoVadis themes, including Environment, Labor and Human Rights, and Sustainable Procurement.

To start, we identified the key performance indicators that Newby would need to track in order to set targets. We also provided support for:

• Aligning each target with EcoVadis methodology and providing reasoning
• Integrating into company-wide policies and commitments
• Development of baseline data to begin tracking progress
• Training and guidance that would empower Newby’s team to continue building internal alignment and support around future reporting

These preliminary targets and commitments are based on the client’s industry and company goals—as well as industry best practice—and range from basic commitments to more company-specific targets.

EcoVadis full disclosure submission

We supported Newby Teas’ full 2025 EcoVadis questionnaire submission, managing the process from project coordination and document collection to disclosure drafting, quality assurance, and final questionnaire upload. We also coordinated the internal drafting and review cycle to ensure the final disclosure was both timely and accurate. By taking on these tasks, our team was able to minimize the burden on Newby’s internal team, creating capacity for them to shift their focus to key initiatives and implementation.

In April 2026, Newby Teas saw a 34% improvement on its score and earned the EcoVadis Committed badge, awarded to companies demonstrating active steps to improve their sustainability practices. The recognition not only differentiated Newby visually to customers but also inspired employees to engage more deeply in sustainability efforts. Newby integrated the badge into its first‑ever sustainability report, highlighting its sustainability progress and future ambitions.

Newby’s work throughout this engagement represents a meaningful leap forward in formalizing the company’s long-standing commitment to sustainability. Although Newby has upheld responsible practices for years, this effort marked the beginning of a more structured, unified approach, bringing together both its corporate operations in the UK and its manufacturing center in India under a single, cohesive sustainability framework. By establishing clear policies, measurable targets, and a roadmap for continuous improvement, Newby laid the groundwork for consistent progress and stronger alignment across the organization.

Results and Deliverables

• Improved EcoVadis Score by 34% and Received Committed Badge
• EcoVadis Gap Analysis & Roadmap
• Policy Development
• Sustainability Target & KPI Development
• Sustainability Program Management
• EcoVadis Full Disclosure Submission