Castor Consulting
We ensure our clients excel in procurement while managing ethics and risk.
Major retailers and fashion brands benefit from Castor Consulting services in a variety of ways, including testing competitiveness of supply bases, sourcing new products, and ensuring supply chains are transparent and ethically compliant.
Services.
Is your organisation operating as effectively, efficiently and ethically as it can?
Our services cover a range of crucial disciplines, including sourcing strategy, supply chain mapping, and social auditing to the client's supplier code of conduct, delivered by an expert team of some of the most experienced people in the fashion industry.
Castor Consulting helps clients across Europe by harnessing internal resources and mobilising teams to develop direct sourcing and quick response channels, and guiding them though change strategies.
Quick Links.
Sourcing Strategy.
Castor Consulting helps retailers align sourcing strategy to company-wide strategic direction, while minimising risk.
Our strategic reviews cover all key product areas, including direction on how to source the right mix of product from the right markets, identifying the optimal sourcing model, and balancing supporting processes to maximise value at given quality specifications.
Once the sourcing strategy is agreed, we help harness the right teams to manage and execute the plans, and monitor success.
Proximity Sourcing.
We help our clients develop the right processes and tools to guarantee successful outcomes in proximity sourcing, which can result in considerable margin gain.
This component of sourcing strategy relies on expert integration of dual-sourcing and quick-response processes within design, merchandising and production, and effective integration between clients and suppliers.
Castor specialises in navigating this critical path discipline, fine-tuning the practice of in-season trading and timely replenishment from Near East markets, to ensure extended sales of best-selling lines and faster response to fashion trends.
Ethical Auditing.
Castor maintains a global network of highly experienced compliance auditors to help its clients ensure they're meeting industry ethical standards.
Our auditors cover a wide range of locations, including Europe, Near East, North Africa, India, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. In Asia we work with two independent associates, depending on locations in mainland China, and many of them are SA8000-certified.
We carry out audits either using internal client standards or other established standards, such as ETI Base Code and WRAP, and can upload results for SEDEX members.
Supplier Compliance.
Castor Consulting can provide complete HQ programs covering policy development for companies that require ethical compliance functions within their Sourcing, Buying and Production departments.
These programs can include the creation of a company-specific Supplier Code of Conduct, staff training, field training, and benchmarking internal standards against prevailing industry practice.
We can also assist in the implementation of cloud-based reporting systems for confidential and realtime information on supplier compliance status.
Supply Chain Mapping.
We carry out supply chain mapping engaging with the client's suppliers and their ethical teams, which forms the foundation of a risk management, due diligence and responsible sourcing framework over the entire supply chain.
Castor helps clients increase visibility and transparency through the Strategic Supplier Accreditation programme, across all tiers of their supply chain.
Ultimately, by meeting current legislation, complying with the Modern Slavery Act, and fulfilling ESG criteria, in time our work will help your business attract new clients and investors.
Strategic Supplier Accreditation and the Modern Slavery Act
Castor consulting works closely with suppliers' procurement and ethical staff to integrate supplier information using a dedicated data platform.
The next stage in the accreditation programme involves joint ethical audits of Tier 2 suppliers, where the supply chain mapping exercise (see above) is conducted, followed by joint audits of Tier 3 and Tier 4 suppliers .
Finally, we run special training sessions for in-house auditors of Tier 2 and 3 suppliers to build capacity in their own supply chains, all the while benchmarking against our client's internal code of conduct and industry legislation.
Our Clients.
Our blue-chip client base consists of a wide range of major fashion and retail brands.
In the past two decades Castor Consulting has worked with and delivered results for some of the largest and most successful retailers and manufacturers in the UK and Europe, and have developed unparalleled methodologies in our field of expertise.
We are highly aware that what we do is commercially sensitive, which is why we maintain a strict code of confidentiality and ensure all client information is completely ring-fenced.
We never solicit work and almost all our assignments come from either personal recommendations or professional referrals.
You can browse some of the larger brands we've worked with below.
White Stuff
About Us.
Castor Consulting was co-founded by Jorge de Silva in 2002 when he left Gap, where he was Director of European Sourcing and Director of Global Compliance for over 15 years.
Since then, he has grown Castor Consulting into a leading advisory firm that guides some of the world's biggest fashion and retail brands in sourcing strategy and ethical supply chains.
The expert team now provides exclusive consultancy services in various countries throughout Europe.
Between us, we have many decades of experience. We speak our clients' language, understand their needs, and recognise that our relationship with them is key to manage programmes within budget and constantly deliver value.