Finisterre, 23-year-old Cornish brand, expands as new EU and UK greenwashing laws take effect

This September, the EU's Empowering Consumers Directive makes vague "eco-friendly" claims illegal across Europe, while UK regulators now hold fining powers of up to 10% of turnover for green claims that don't stand up. Most of fashion is quietly rewriting its labels. One brand isn't: Finisterre, born in 2003 in a flat above a Cornish surf shop, has spent 23 years building the receipts — repairs, rentals, resale, recycled wetsuits — and is expanding while the greenwashers retreat.

The era of consequence-free green claims ends this year: from September, the EU outlaws unsubstantiated environmental marketing, and the UK's competition regulator can now fine companies up to a tenth of global turnover for misleading sustainability claims. For most of the fashion industry, that's a compliance crisis. For Finisterre, it's the market finally arriving at its front door. The Cornish brand has spent 23 years doing the unglamorous version of sustainability — the kind with paperwork. B Corp certified, its products are built from renewable and recycled textiles, natural fibres and Yulex natural rubber, with a transparent supply chain behind every wetsuit, cardigan and beanie. Its business model is the receipt. Finisterre repairs its own garments through the Lived & Loved programme, resells worn pieces via Reskinned, takes back old gear, rents Yulex wetsuits rather than insisting you buy one, recycles dead wetsuits into new ones — and closes its tills for Blue Friday while the rest of retail discounts. None of it has stopped the company growing. What began as one fleece sold from a three-page website now sells to 150 countries, with 11 UK stores including a 2,702 sq ft Covent Garden flagship — its largest — and in January the company hired Superdry's former head of international retail, Joe Ward, to lead its shops as it grows. There is also a moral engine under the commerce: the Finisterre Foundation, launched in 2021 to reduce and ultimately remove barriers to the sea, enabling equal access to the ocean for all — from adaptive Seasuits to surf therapy — while the brand's campaigns put its community in front of the sewage crisis fouling the very coastline it depends on. "For two decades, saying it was cheaper than doing it — and the brands that just said it grew faster than us," says CEO Will Sheane. "That arbitrage dies this September. Every claim we make has a repair ticket, a rental record or a supply chain behind it, and it turns out the slow way was also the durable way. We're not adjusting to the new rules; we've been rehearsing them for 23 years." Finisterre remains headquartered at Wheal Kitty Workshops in St Agnes, on the Cornish clifftop where it started, with around 320 staff.

Trend context

New EU and UK laws banning unsubstantiated environmental claims take effect this September, forcing a reckoning across the fashion industry. As regulators begin to enforce fines up to 10% of global turnover for greenwashing, retail and business desks will be looking for brands that exemplify genuine sustainability. Finisterre, with 23 years of verifiable circular practices and a mission rooted in ocean protection, offers a compelling counter-narrative for journalists covering this industry-wide shift.

About Finisterre

Why we exist

Finisterre exists for the people who live where land ends. It was born in 2003 above a surf shop in St Agnes because British cold-water surfers had a choice between gear built for boardrooms or for Bali — nothing made for a November Atlantic. From the first fleece, the belief has held: make truly exceptional products for the sea, in a way the sea can live with, and never make the ocean pay for the profit.

How we do it

We design for decades, not seasons: recycled and renewable fabrics, natural Yulex rubber instead of neoprene, and a supply chain we publish rather than protect. Then we keep products alive — repairing them through Lived & Loved, reselling them through Reskinned, taking back the worn-out, renting wetsuits to people who need salt water more than ownership, and remaking dead wetsuits into new ones. On Black Friday, we close the tills and go to the beach.

What we do

Finisterre is a B Corp certified outdoor apparel brand headquartered in St Agnes, Cornwall, designing menswear, womenswear, Yulex® natural-rubber wetsuits, swimwear and accessories built for life in and around the sea. Founded in 2003 by Tom Kay and led by CEO Will Sheane, it sells to 150 countries online and through 11 UK stores, including its Covent Garden flagship, with prices from £20 socks to £295 waterproofs. It also operates a wetsuit rental service, a repairs programme and a charitable foundation.

Why it matters

Fashion's dirty secret was that virtue was a copywriting decision — "conscious" collections from the world's biggest polluters, priced to undercut anyone doing it properly. That con is now being outlawed on two fronts, and the question every shopper and regulator will ask is: who was telling the truth all along? Finisterre is one of the few brands whose answer is a paper trail — and whose home coastline, fouled by sewage discharges, gives its ocean mission stakes you can smell.

Who it's for

The cold-water person. The dawn swimmer at 8°C, the surfer checking the sewage map before the swell map, the coastal walker whose jacket has to survive a decade of horizontal rain. They're 30 to 60, they've read the ingredient list of their own wardrobe, and they've stopped believing labels that say "conscious." They'd rather own six things that last than sixty that don't — and they want the brand they wear to fight for the water they're standing in.

Proof points

23 years of continuous operation since 2003; B Corp certified, recertified in 2021 11 UK stores and customers in 150 countries — from a company that launched with one fleece on a three-page website Largest-ever store: a 2,702 sq ft flagship on Neal Street, Covent Garden Around 320 employees, headquartered at Wheal Kitty Workshops, St Agnes Circular systems in live operation: repairs (Lived & Loved), resale and takeback (Reskinned), Yulex® wetsuit rental, and Wetsuits From Wetsuits recycling Backed by Active Partners, with roughly $10.7M raised across two rounds

Traction & credibility

Finisterre has moved from cult Cornish label to national brand without shedding its certification or its clifftop HQ: a Covent Garden flagship opened in May 2025, Superdry's former head of international retail joined in January to run its stores, and its CMO shared a Shoptalk Europe stage this June with The Ordinary and Bremont on brand storytelling. Collaborations span VEJA, Snow Peak, XTRATUF, Baabuk and designer Amy Powney; its Hell Or High Water podcast and Broadcast journal anchor a genuine community; and the Finisterre Foundation partners with Level Water, City Kids Surfing and Tonic Surf to open the sea to those it's hardest for.

Spokespeople

Will Sheane

CEO

Sheane runs the experiment everyone in sustainable fashion is watching: whether the slow way can scale. Under his leadership Finisterre has unified its online and store operations, opened its biggest-ever flagship in Covent Garden, and recruited retail leadership from Superdry to take the brand national — all while keeping the B Corp certification and the repairs bench that most scaling brands quietly drop. He talks about growth the way an engineer talks about load-bearing walls: which parts of the mission can never be traded, and why the regulation arriving this autumn rewards exactly that discipline.

Tom Kay

Founder

Kay started Finisterre in 2003 in a flat above a surf shop in St Agnes, with one fleece and a conviction: British cold-water surfers deserved gear built for their ocean, made in a way that didn't cost the ocean. Twenty-three years on, the company he founded still operates from the same clifftop, now certified as a B Corp with a foundation — launched in 2021 — dedicated to removing barriers between people and the sea. He is the origin story in person: the surfer who bet that permanence could be a business model two decades before the law agreed.

Bronwyn Foster Butler

CMO

Foster Butler is the voice of the brand's activism-with-receipts approach — this June she stood on the Shoptalk Europe stage alongside The Ordinary and Bremont to explain what brand storytelling looks like when it's operational rather than ornamental, citing how Finisterre enables surfers to confront their government about sewage in the sea. She owns the campaigns that make the mission tangible: Blue Friday's closed tills, Women of the Sea, Sea7 ocean activism training. She can carry the marketing-industry story — what becomes of brand claims when the vague ones are illegal.

Talking points

The insight

Finisterre, the 23-year-old Cornish brand, scales as new EU and UK laws dismantle greenwashing in fashion.

finisterre.com

The story

The change: the greenwash economy is being dismantled by law — EU rules banning unsubstantiated eco-claims apply from September, UK regulators can now fine up to 10% of turnover — and the 23-year-old Cornish brand that never needed the vague words is scaling into the vacuum, flagship first.

Why it matters

For two decades, honest brands were undercut by competitors whose sustainability lived in the marketing department — the con taxed every shopper trying to buy better and every company doing it properly. The victims are the truth-tellers who grew slower; the enemy is claim-without-receipt retail. When the law finally arrives, the market needs proof that the honest model works commercially — and an 11-store, 150-country, Covent-Garden-flagship business built on repairs and rentals is that proof.

Who does it impact

Every consumer who's been greenwashed; retail and business desks covering the September enforcement wave; marketing trades asking what claims survive the new rules; the cold-water swimming and surf communities Finisterre serves; and the coastal economy of Cornwall, where a clifftop workshop became a national brand without leaving.

Proof points

From September, the EU's Empowering Consumers Directive bans generic environmental claims that can't be substantiated; the UK's CMA can fine misleading claims up to 10% of global turnover The receipts: live repairs programme, Reskinned resale and takeback, Yulex® wetsuit rental, Wetsuits From Wetsuits recycling, published supply chain, B Corp certification The scale: 150 countries, 11 UK stores, a 2,702 sq ft Covent Garden flagship — and ex-Superdry retail leadership hired in January to grow further 23 years old, ~320 staff, still headquartered above the sea in St Agnes The mission with stakes: a foundation removing barriers to ocean access, and campaigns confronting the sewage crisis on the brand's own doorstep

CTA

Visit finisterre.com, or contact press@finisterre.com to arrange interviews, samples, or a visit to the Wheal Kitty clifftop HQ.

Key facts

EU Directive Name: Empowering Consumers Directive
EU Enforcement Date: September 2026
UK Regulator: CMA
UK Fine for Misleading Claims: Up to 10% of global turnover
Finisterre Founded: 2003
B Corp Recertification: 2021
Number of UK Stores: 11
Countries Served Online: 150
Covent Garden Flagship Opening: May 2025
CEO: Will Sheane
Founder: Tom Kay
CMO: Bronwyn Foster Butler
Circular Systems in Operation: Lived & Loved (repairs), Reskinned (resale/takeback), Yulex® wetsuit rental, Wetsuits From Wetsuits (recycling)

Get in touch

Bronwyn Foster Butler

CMO

Drop me a note and I'll reply by email.