Our Values

We take our responsibilities seriously to ensure a sustainable future for our people and our planet. Our company takes a leadership stance within the fashion and textiles sector to promote these values throughout the industry.

We are committed to manufacturing in Britain and have never taken production overseas. We prioritize local jobs, local economic prosperity and operate a production process with minimum impact on the environment.

Modern slavery

We are fully committed to ensuring employee welfare and human rights are respected both in our own business and throughout our entire supply chain. We fully support the legislation put in place for the prevention of modern slavery and human trafficking in the Modern Slavery Act 2015.

The fashion and textiles industry is a complex one, typically with many tiers forming supply chains that stretch across the globe; we manufacture in the UK and therefore have direct influence over production.

Our long-term relationships with fabric suppliers offer good insight into their operating practises and working conditions, however we do understand this is only part of the picture. To fully understand our entire supply network and to ensure responsible practise at each stage of production we have traced raw materials and components as far back as possible and continue to map and gather data to inform our purchasing choices.

Health and safety

David Nieper Limited is fully committed to meeting its responsibilities under the Health & Safety at Work Act 1974, the Management of Health & Safety at Work Regulations 1999 and associated protective legislation, both as an Employer and as a Company.

To achieve these objectives we have appointed designated members of staff to be responsible for Company health and safety; to keep workplace health, safety and welfare procedures under constant review; to liaise with the Health and Safety Executive wherever necessary; and to keep the Company and its Board of Directors abreast of new legislation, EU Directives, Regulations and British Standards, in order to ensure ongoing compliance with the law.

Staff - Wellbeing and development

We are proud that David Nieper was the first British fashion manufacturer to be included in the ‘Best 100 Companies to Work For’ list by The Sunday Times. The company scored highly for looking after staff wellbeing, with a consistently low staff turnover and 50% of the company holding long service awards of 10+ years.

We are committed to quality and sustainable production, promoting the knowledge and skills of past and future generations through jobs, education and investment in our people, industry and community.

We follow a workforce development plan, the aim being to become a learning organisation so that every person can improve, learn and progress. As such there is a comprehensive set of policies in place to ensure staff wellbeing.

Education and social mobility

The David Nieper approach to social responsibility is both altruistic and far reaching, not only creating jobs for local people, but also prioritising the educational welfare of local children.

To help raise the level of education and skills in the area, David Nieper has taken the unprecedented step of setting up an education trust and sponsoring the local secondary school which had been in the bottom two percent of schools for attainment in the UK.

In 2015, the David Nieper Education Trust was formed. Academisation of the former school took place on 1st September 2016, creating the David Nieper Academy. Students moved into their new £15m school building in February 2017, with new teaching staff and a new uniform free for all students. A new sixth form college opened in September 2017.

After less than 3 years of opening the school has almost tripled the number of students joining, been reported as improving in its first Ofsted inspection and is oversubscribed for the first time in over 25 years. The school’s reputation has been transformed within the community and is fast becoming the school of choice for local parents.

David Nieper has an extensive social mobility programme and believes that no child should be disadvantaged because of background. As such the company strives to engage with young people at each stage of their education journey; from primary school design competitions, to secondary school work experience programmes, university scholarships for undergraduates, vocational training within the company’s own onsite sewing school and taking the lead in developing industry apprenticeships.

Find out more about the David Nieper Education Trust and Sewing Academy.