Now that Open Supply Hub has worked with over 1500 organizations on supply chain disclosures, mapping over one million production locations in the process, we’ve seen a lot of different versions of supply chain transparency – both on and off Open Supply Hub – with varying levels of effectiveness. Knowing this, one of the most common questions we get from stakeholders about supply chain transparency is: what does “standard” look like? And what does “above and beyond” look like?
Here are some of the trends and best practices we’ve seen for brands and retailers sharing supply chain data and, if you’re using Open Supply Hub, how to apply them when sharing your data on our free and open supply chain transparency platform. These aren’t meant to be definitive answers on what should/shouldn’t be shared, but rather starting points informed by what we’ve seen already disclosed in recent years:
Which supply chain data points should I share?
- Standard: The Transparency Pledge in the apparel sector has a baseline that can be applied to other sectors as well*. They are:
- The full name of all authorized production units and processing facilities
- The site addresses
- The parent company of the business at the site
- Type of products made
- Worker numbers at each site
*The Supply Chain Data Exchange is a multi-stakeholder effort working to formalize this expansion beyond apparel.
- Above and Beyond: If you are looking for more comprehensive resources on this, the Ethical Trading Initiative (ETI)’s Corporate Transparency Framework and the Know the Chain Good Practice Guide are two open resources you can turn to. In our work, these are some of the additional data points we’ve seen disclosed most often or heard the greatest interest in from stakeholders we work with:
- % female workers
- % migrant workers
- Length of relationship with facility
- Native language name
- Certifications
- Social / environmental improvement programs run
- Unionization / worker representation at facility
- Water use
- GHG emissions
- How it works on Open Supply Hub: Open Supply Hub was initially built to ensure alignment with Transparency Pledge requirements. We require at a bare minimum the country, name and address of each production location submitted, with a strong recommendation to include the sector(s) in which that location operates. From there, stakeholders can choose to share any of the additional Transparency Pledge requirements to their disclosure on our public good, or any additional custom data points of their choosing using our Embedded Map functionality.
M&S Embedded Map on their Sustainability page.
How often should I update my supply chain disclosure?
- Standard: Stakeholders should be updating their data at least once a year, which aligns with the transparency requirements of many multi-stakeholder initiatives.
- Above and Beyond: The answer to this question really speaks to why you are sharing data in the first place. If the goal is to collaborate with more stakeholders in the locations or regions where you are working, then as up-to-date data as you can handle is best, and this really depends on the sector you work in. We see companies updating seasonally, monthly, or even more frequently, depending on how dynamic their supply chain might be. We also see more and more stakeholders leaving historical lists live to show how their supply chain is changing over time and to better inform meaningful stakeholder engagement and due diligence processes.
- How it works on Open Supply Hub: At this time, we don’t have any mandates about how frequently data needs to be updated on Open Supply Hub, so you can choose your own frequency. When you upload a dataset to OS Hub, you have the opportunity to put details about the dataset in the list name and description, and this can include the dates the data you are uploading is current to (i.e. a date range, a year, or a season, as well as whether the suppliers listed are past, current, or prospective). You can also add new and additional datasets to OS Hub without taking previous datasets down, so you can have multiple datasets live at a time to allow for different update frequencies by tier or product type and leave as many historical datasets live as you like. If you want to share your current suppliers in real-time, you can also set up API integration between your internal systems and OS Hub to push new individual suppliers to your disclosure on OS Hub as you are ready to do so.
How many tiers of supply chain data should I share?
- Standard: Many companies start with Tier 1 or direct suppliers and aim for 95-100% disclosure, but we always say – sharing something is better than sharing nothing. We appreciate the transparency with which Neiman Marcus Group has framed their data – for instance: “The Neiman Marcus Group factories listed on OS Hub is a partial list of Private Label factories. As a work in progress, this list will continue to grow until NMG discloses 100% of all private label factories.”
- Above and Beyond: This is probably one of the topics stakeholders most want to understand – how many companies are disclosing “beyond Tier 1?” As examples of trends in this direction, we’ve seen the Partnership for Sustainable Textiles move their transparency requirements for members to Tier 2 in 2025. ETI lists “Publish an extended supplier list, going beyond tier one, demonstrating high-risk areas” in their “Better Practice” section of their Corporate Transparency Framework. On Open Supply Hub, roughly 49% of the locations that have a “Facility Type” listed, are facilities upstream of “Final Product Assembly.” Going even further, we have stakeholders like Sunrock and Devold of Norway sharing 6+ tiers of their supply chain, and companies like Asda sharing labor and packaging suppliers. So the answer is that there are lots of ways to go above and beyond, and sharing at least tier 2 suppliers looks to be the direction of travel.
- How it works on Open Supply Hub: OS Hub is happy to host as many tiers of data as you are comfortable sharing – from Tier 1 to the raw material level – we just don’t host the names and addresses of individuals. So for farms or cooperatives, for instance, we would ask you to only include locations with a business name. No matter how many tiers of data you are sharing, there are two ways you can make your level of disclosure clear:
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- In your list name/description, you can include how many Tiers of data are in that list. You can also divide your data into multiple lists (e.g. one list for each tier you are uploading).
- If you have this level of granularity, you can also fill in the facility/processing type column in the OS Hub upload template, sharing what the location is and/or the types of activities that occur there.
Sunrock’s contribution consists of multiple tiers of their supply chain.
Where/how should I share my supply chain information?
- Standard: Pointing again to The Transparency Pledge, publishing data in machine-readable formats, like an Excel spreadsheet, ensures that the data can be worked with. PDFs are discouraged by many, as they are difficult to make and maintain, and difficult to use. Many companies are publishing these on a page on their website related to supply chains or ESG topics.
- Best Practice: Ideally, companies create one source of truth for their supply chain data, so conflicting versions or formats are not floating around on different websites – causing confusion for stakeholders – and host it somewhere that is easily found when searching for it. Putting a link inside a sustainability report PDF instead of a reports page on a corporate website makes it incredibly difficult for stakeholders to find and make use of the data. Think about the terms you would search if you were trying to find your supplier list (like [company name] supply chain or supplier list) and try to use those terms on your page, so it comes up for stakeholders who are searching for it.
- How it works on Open Supply Hub: If you share your supply chain data on Open Supply Hub, our goal is that you won’t have to worry about keeping a separate spreadsheet up-to-date on your website. Once you’ve uploaded your data to OS Hub, you can generate a URL to your dataset, which you can then link to on your website, which users can then filter, search and download into CSV/Excel files as needed. You can also go even further and generate a custom, mini version of OS Hub with just your data, to embed on your website. In both these situations, you are creating a single source of truth on OS Hub, which you can keep up to date, and then point stakeholders to it, so you don’t have to worry about version control across static files.
Overall, think about the stakeholders who are going to use your data. Just as your marketing team is thinking about how to get more customers to navigate your website and buy your products, how can you design your disclosure so that your stakeholders can make the most of it? Think about:
- What am I doing to make this data interoperable and easy to push and pull into systems for quick analysis?
- Is this data being shared in a context or format that makes it easy to interpret, search, filter, and visualize?
- Am I making this data easy to discover? And, if not, does that align with the spirit of the disclosure I’m making?
Transparency shouldn’t be done for transparency’s sake, or as a tick-box exercise. Rather – ask yourself: what am I trying to achieve by sharing this data, and set up your disclosure so you and your stakeholders can make the most of it. Hopefully, the trends and tips in this article give you a strong foundation to start from.
Find out more and integrate OS Hub into your supply chain transparency strategy:
(1) How to Share your data, (2) Search and download our free and open supply chain dataset, (3) Read more stories of impact. If you prefer video, check out our YouTube channel.
