Little is known in the Sustainable Supply Chain Management (SSCM) literature about whether and to what extent international customers (ICs) are able to control sustainability compliance (compliance) upstream in their supply chain. By drawing on the notion of direct and indirect control in business networks and qualitative fieldwork in the Sri Lankan apparel supply chain, this paper examines how ICs control nominated and second-tier sub-suppliers (nominated sub- suppliers) to manage compliance, as well as the implications for their first-tier (direct) suppliers. By unveiling the way ICs exert direct coercive control and indirect normative control on nominated sub-suppliers, our paper provides theorizing of nominated procurement and its effects expected to create valid or validatable insights for emerging markets. Crucially, our paper provides a tangible example of how the indirect control may be stronger than the direct one, yet have consequences for both direct suppliers, sub-suppliers but also raw material suppliers. Reactive patterns as expected in any network would be hampered by this indirect control, while creating ingredients of distrust with suppliers."