Discover how businesses are using PIM to prepare for the EU’s Digital Product Passport (DPP)—centralizing product data, enabling supply chain transparency, and supporting sustainability goals. Learn how this powerful combination helps brands stay compliant, build trust, and deliver the clear, accurate product information customers expect in a more circular economy.
Keywords
The Digital Product Passport (DPP) was introduced in 2024 as part of the EU’s broader push toward a circular economy, altering how product information is managed and consumed. With its push for greater transparency and circularity, the DPP brings new expectations - and new pressure - for anyone selling into the EU.
Brands are now faced with a critical question: how do you ensure your product data is consistent and ready to meet evolving regulatory demands? What could possibly help streamline this process, reduce manual work, and keep you a step ahead of compliance?
Well, let’s find out!
The Digital Product Passport (DPP) is a regulatory initiative introduced by the European Union in 2024. It creates a standardized digital record that collects and shares essential data about a product and its supply chain—such as materials, origin, environmental impact, and end-of-life options.
The goal of DPP is to increase transparency across value chains and support a more sustainable circular economy, bringing key benefits such as:
By making this information available across the product lifecycle, the DPP empowers everyone including manufacturers, repairers, retailers, and consumers to make smarter, more sustainable decisions.
The Digital Product Passport regulation doesn’t just impact one niche corner of the market—it applies to textile, electronic, automotive, plastics, chemicals, and battery industries that create, distribute, regulate, or purchase physical goods in the EU. If you conduct any part of your business in the EU, you’ll likely have to comply at some point - from factories to fitting rooms, the DPP introduces new responsibilities and opportunities for transparency, traceability, and sustainability for millions of different businesses.
Here’s how different stakeholders will feel the impact:
Manufacturers will need to integrate comprehensive data collection processes to document product origins, materials, environmental impact, and compliance with sustainability standards. This initiative aligns with the EU’s Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation (ESPR), which mandates the use of DPPs to enhance product sustainability and circularity.
Suppliers and logistics providers will be expected to feed reliable data into the DPP system such as sourcing information, material composition, and transport-related emissions, which means closer collaboration across tiers and greater visibility into upstream and downstream operations.
Regulators will need to have access to standardized, real-time data through DPPs, streamlining the monitoring of compliance with environmental and safety standards. This enhanced transparency supports the enforcement of regulations such as the EU’s Circular Economy Action Plan, which aims to make sustainable products the norm in the EU market.
Retailers will be responsible for ensuring that the products they offer are accompanied by DPPs, providing consumers with accessible information on product sustainability and compliance. This transparency can enhance consumer trust and influence purchasing decisions as nearly 60% of millennials are willing to pay a premium for sustainably produced products.
Consumers will benefit from increased access to information regarding product composition, environmental impact, and end-of-life options, enabling more informed purchasing decisions and supporting sustainable consumption patterns. The DPP initiative addresses the current lack of reliable product data, bridging the gap between consumer demand for transparency and available information.
It’s easy to look at DPP regulation as a burden and a a digital checklist for businesses, but in reality, it’s a big leap toward a market where transparency isn’t optional, accountability matters, and everyone from manufacturers to consumers can make smarter, more sustainable choices.
But that kind of transformation doesn’t happen overnight—and definitely not without the right tools. So, what could help businesses actually get ready for this new data-driven, transparency-first era?
The answer is a Product Information Management (PIM) system.
A PIM solution centralizes and structures all your product data in one place, making it easier to collect information from suppliers, enrich it with sustainability attributes, standardize formats, and distribute it to the right platforms—including future DPP interfaces.
By building your product data foundation on a robust PIM, you’re not only setting yourself up for smoother compliance, but you’re also reducing manual effort, improving data quality, and ensuring consistency across markets.
A PIM system centralizes product data from across your supply chain, making it easier to track sourcing, production inputs, and environmental impact—all key for DPP compliance. In fact, 55% of business leaders identified improving supply chain visibility as a top priority, highlighting the growing demand for transparency and data-driven decision-making.
For businesses operating in the EU, preparing for the DPP isn’t just about staying compliant. When paired with a robust PIM system, the DPP becomes a powerful tool for building transparency, strengthening customer trust, and gaining a competitive edge. A PIM helps brands gather, manage, and distribute the detailed product data the DPP requires, making it easier to showcase sustainability efforts in a credible, consistent way across all channels.
For customers, this translates to greater clarity and confidence. With access to standardized, trustworthy product data—powered by PIM and delivered through the DPP—consumers can easily understand what products are made of, how they were produced, and how they can be repaired, recycled, or reused.
The Digital Product Passport is a signal that the future of commerce is transparent, data-driven, and increasingly circular. For businesses, that future comes with both pressure and potential. Getting ahead of the curve means more than just checking compliance boxes; it means building the infrastructure to support better product data and stronger relationships with customers, partners, and regulators.
That is exactly why a PIM system is necessary. By centralizing, structuring, and streamlining your product information, PIM doesn’t just help you meet DPP requirements - it sets you up to thrive in a market that values both accuracy and sustainability.
Together, the DPP and a strong PIM foundation give businesses the tools to turn compliance into a competitive advantage!
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