Alison shares her circular economy expertise from the 'beginning' of textile supply chains as a wholesaler, manufacturer and developer of sustainable textiles working with mills in India, Indonesia, China and Germany for more than ten years. In 2020 Alison developed CircStretch, a new bio-stretch textile to reduce the plastic in performance stretch garments using specialty yarns by Lenzing Group and Asahi Kasei with the worlds first Cradle to Cradle Gold Standard elastane.
Her focus shifted to the circular economy in 2019 when she received an Australian government grant from NSW EPA, creating Australia’s first Circular Textile Waste Service. Working across textile manufacturers, local councils, Virgin Airlines, denim brands and R-Cyclers plus the beginnings of recycling and waste networks, Alison quickly saw a recurring challenge: inability to identify materials and trace products to brands, siloed industries, lost resources, and missed revenue streams were limiting the impact of circular initiatives.
It was here that she realised a truly affordable, people- and planet-first circular system needed to start at the very beginning—brands had to integrate Digital Product Passports from the design stage, enabling products to actively participate in circular systems rather than relying on end-of-life interventions - and do-so at scale.
“I was amazed that at the exact same time, the EU Commission had reached the same conclusion and was introducing mandatory DPP regulations,” she recalls. This alignment confirmed a global trend: traceable, interoperable product data is central to scaling circular economies, and inspired Alison to launch the Global Circular Network to turn this vision into an industrial-scale reality.
Formerly known as Circlolink, in 2023 was included on the European Commission's CIRPASS list of DPP solutions, and re-branded as the Global Circular Network.