Everything You Need to Know About Digital Product Passports

Alexandra Harrell
·6 min read

TrusTrace’s third playbook, “Unlocking DPP: The Why, What and How of Digital Product Passports,” is a wide-ranging guide for industry professionals looking to navigate the widely anticipated implementation of digital product passports.

The supply chain traceability and compliance platform’s road map walks readers through the upcoming European Commission mandate that every textile product sold in the EU be “eco-designed” with a digital product passport (DPP), to be implemented between 2026 and 2030.

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“As the industry shifts from minimal regulation to a significant surge in both the volume and intricacy of global laws, it’s clear that the potential for it to become overwhelming is palpable. The DPP is no exception, as its extensive data demands on a per-product basis will necessitate gathering and validating data that has historically been hard to access,” Shameek Ghosh, TrusTrace co-founder and CEO, said. “Nevertheless, true visionaries can look beyond the immediate disruptions and challenges and recognize the potential this data holds. The possession of detailed supply chain data empowers brands to adopt a proactive stance, enabling them to maintain control rather than being caught off guard by the inevitable disruptions. DPPs serve as a critical element in constructing the data, insights, and infrastructure necessary to drive a truly circular economy, as well as unlocking novel business opportunities, but how to effectively create and implement them is not clear today. This is what we are aiming to clarify in this book.”

The guide, authored by journalist Brooke Roberts-Islam, takes a four-pronged approach.

The Why

The book first explores the “why” behind DPP: its purpose, relation to EU regulations and how it will impact the industry.

For a refresher: DPP is just one requirement of a larger set of plans the EU has to crack down on meeting climate targets. In 2020, the European Commission introduced the European Green Deal: a set of policies to diminish net greenhouse gas emissions by at least 55 percent by 2030. Under the Green Deal umbrella is the Circular Economy Action Plan (CEAP), a call to action to create more sustainable products. Within CEAP is the EU Strategy for Textiles. This initiative includes laws, regulations and guidance relevant to the textile industry, including the Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation (ESPR) and, within it, the requirement for each product to have a DPP.

“DPPs are just one facet of many regulations intended to help deliver the EU Green Deal’s aim of ‘green growth’ and net-zero emissions,” the guidebook reads. “DPPs will help unlock the circular economy potential of textile products.”

DPPs aim to enhance sustainable production, extend product lifetimes, support consumers in making sustainable choices and assist authorities in verifying compliance.

The What

So, what exactly is a DPP? Well, it’s a “critical enabler” for ensuring that the most relevant product information is readily available on an item. It consists of three primary components: data, a unique identifier that can be accessed via a data carrier, and IT systems to facilitate data interoperability, the report explained.

The data is the digital information. DPPs will serve as the “digital fingerprint” of an individual item, detailing where it was made, what it was made with and its circularity potential. The unique identifier serves as a “permanent hallmark” through the product’s lifestyle, TrusTrace said, accessible through a data carrier (like an RFID or NFC tag).

“The ESPR stipulates that access to DPP data should be provided freely and with minimal barriers, accompanied by well-defined access rights, ensuring that users can readily obtain the information they require without undue complexity,” the report said, noting that the technical system requirements are not particularly well defined.

The When

When a “revolutionary” regulation like ESPR is introduced (which it was, on April 23), it comes with what’s known as “Delegated Acts,” which explain the “nitty gritty” details of how to comply with ESPR and what data needs to be captured in the DPP. These acts are still being worked out, though they are expected to be adopted at the end of 2025. A year later, the implementation of the requirements for textile products will begin, with enforcement starting in 2028, per the report.

TrusTrace points out that even though these standards and requirements are still being finalized, brands and retailers must take action now to be adequately prepared.

The How

But how should they take action, considering no complete DPP data or system solution is available?

To conduct a textile-specific pilot of DPP, TrusTrace led a pilot study in partnership with Trace4Value in hopes of fulfilling the DPP requirements, as outlined in the ESPR, to help guide the industry toward readiness. The pilot focused on establishing the textile product data needs for DPP, using standards and protocols to enable the system’s interoperability, building the best architecture and infrastructure to collect and share DPP data, and creating a user interface connected to the scannable data carrier for the consumer to engage with.

The pilot ran on a live supply chain data in a live environment with real products and real suppliers. Consortium members included TrusTrace, Circularista, GS1 Sweden and Swedish Institute of Standards, Kappahl and Marimekko, TexRoad Foundation, 2BPolicy, Rudholm Group, Trimco Group and Aalto University.

“The operational components and requirements of the DPP are poorly understood, which is why we joined the Trace4Value project,” Sandra Roos, vice president of sustainability at Kappahl, said. “We learned invaluable insights—such as the need for DPP data fields shown to consumers to be standardized—among many others, and we’re proud to provide our perspective for this playbook, to contribute to making it a comprehensive resource on what’s required for compliance with incoming DPP legislation.”

Marimekko also highlighted the potential customer and commercial benefits.

“In the future, DPP has potential to create customer value as a part of product storytelling and lifecycle,” Marjut Lovio, Marimekko sustainability manager, said. “We believe this guide can help the industry in moving toward circular business models.”

Both Kappahl and Marimekko said that obtaining the DPP data for the pilot was occasionally resource intensive, acknowledging that implementing the necessary downstream product traceability and data collection will require investing in more technologies at a product level, the report said. Overall, TrusTrace encourages brands and retailers to take action now to evaluate their internal data systems, begin data collection and assess any data gaps as well as consider the business opportunity that DPP presents.

“The quicker you prepare for compliance, the smoother the transition will be for you and your customer group,” Nicolaj Reffstrup, co-founder of Ganni, said. “This guide is a great resource to get started on that journey and navigate the current uncertainties of legislation.”