ESGeo | Case Study | De Rigo Vision’s journey with ESGeo

De Rigo Vision is an Italian group active in the design, production and distribution of prescription eyewear and sunglasses, with an established presence in international markets and a value chain that integrates manufacturing, commercial and distribution activities.

The company operates in a sector where design, product quality, materials management, supply chain control, and distribution capabilities are central elements of the business model. Internal production, the purchase of finished products, supplier relationships, and logistics therefore represent key areas from an ESG perspective as well, as they are linked to significant environmental, social, and organisational impacts.

The Challenge

Like many companies in the manufacturing sector, De Rigo Vision is facing an increasingly concrete question: which sustainability aspects truly matter for its business model?

The regulatory pressure linked to the CSRD (Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive), the growing attention of customers and stakeholders to ESG topics, and the need to direct resources towards actual priorities call for a structured response. Not a generic approach to sustainability, but an analysis grounded in the specific features of the company’s processes and in the real impacts generated by its activities.

For De Rigo Vision, the challenge is therefore to identify the most relevant ESG topics across its value chain, distinguishing between areas that are already managed, areas to be strengthened, and priorities on which to build a concrete improvement path, also with a view to future sustainability reporting.

The Approach

ESGeo supported De Rigo Vision in a process aimed at analysing and understanding its sustainability profile, working closely with the company team to ensure that the results were rooted in the company’s operational reality.
The work began with a review of company documents and discussion sessions with internal representatives, followed by an on-site visit to directly validate the mapping within the production departments. This made it possible to analyse the processes most relevant to the business, from product development to production and assembly, from the purchase of finished products to logistics, also including support processes such as procurement, human resources management and facility management.
The analysis provided a comprehensive overview of the ESG aspects most relevant to De Rigo Vision, with particular attention to their implications from the perspective of future CSRD reporting. The topics that emerged are mainly concentrated in manufacturing activities, resource management, workers’ health and safety, and the development and empowerment of people.

Production and resource management

Plastic and metal processing represent one of the most relevant areas from an ESG perspective, due to the impacts associated with energy consumption, waste and scrap generation, the use of chemical substances and water resource management. The analysis highlighted that some aspects are already managed through internal procedures, monitoring systems and initiatives launched by the company, while others, such as energy efficiency, resource recovery and the transition towards renewable sources, represent priority areas on which to further structure the improvement path.

Workers’ health and safety

The presence of manual operations and repetitive movements makes health and safety a central topic for De Rigo Vision’s production model. The company actively monitors ergonomic risks through recognised standards and has already introduced mitigation measures, training activities and adaptations to workspaces and work tools. This is therefore an area that is already managed, while requiring continuous monitoring to ensure prevention, wellbeing and the protection of people within the production departments.

People and diversity

The analysis highlighted a corporate culture focused on valuing people, with concrete initiatives relating to gender equality, training, wellbeing and inclusion. The elements that emerged include the analysis of the gender pay gap, the pathway linked to UNI/PdR 125:2022 certification, internal communication activities and initiatives supporting the return from maternity leave. These aspects represent an existing asset within the organisation, to be formalised and communicated in a more structured way as part of the ESG journey.

The Impact

The project enabled De Rigo Vision to develop a deeper and more structured understanding of its sustainability context, with a particular focus on the impacts related to produc4tion activities, which have historically been at the core of the company’s business model and, at the same time, represent the area with the most significant ESG implications.

Management now has an integrated, process-based view of the ESG aspects that characterise De Rigo Vision’s activities: not a generic list of sector-related topics, but a map of actual impacts, existing strengths and priorities on which to focus future efforts.