Brand Sustainability and Why It Matters

In the business world, trends are generated by the consumer; one of the most powerful trends in recent years is the drive for sustainability. At first, consumers would prefer brands that had sustainability in mind. Now, they’re actively avoiding brands that are unsustainable, accelerating this into a leading concern for businesses of all sizes.

According to estimates, landfills around the world receive two billion tons of waste every single day. Everybody has to contribute to the cause, and businesses aren’t exempt from this. In recent years, we’ve all been rethinking the way we package and even develop products. Single-use plastics are widely rejected, leading to more efficient creations from manufacturers around the globe.

As a brand, it’s important to give this area of the business some attention. If you continue to waste materials and harm the environment in both the development and packaging stages, consumers will leave your side and cozy up with competitors instead.

What’s Brand Sustainability?

Nowadays, brand sustainability takes companies way beyond the need to make money. Companies that are sustainable also actively considering their responsibility towards social and environmental impacts of business. Depending on where you look, different definitions will arise for brand sustainability. However, there’s a general definition that considers the responsibility, integrity, and sensibility of the business towards social and environmental matters.

Important Feature for Consumers

What is it that consumers look for in a brand? Here are some of the most common factors considered when choosing one brand over another:

1. Packaging Waste

If you want to keep customers happy, don’t wrap your products in three layers of plastic. Can you reduce the packaging and offer a more sleek, minimal solution for customers? If not, ensure that the materials you do use are reusable or recyclable. There’s a phrase that seems to have died out, but it’s more applicable than ever for businesses — reduce, reuse, recycle.

Reducing packaging waste actually has a multi-faceted effect. This is something that many businesses forget. Sure, you help the environment. But it also allows customers to help the environment because they’re choosing you over another, more wasteful, service.

Here are some tips to help your packaging waste goals:

• Use a reusable or recyclable material
• Give your packaging another purpose (H&M’s bags transform into hangers, for example)
• Get materials from a sustainable source
• Use biodegradable packaging (this will never reach the landfills)

Additionally, packaging waste can entail staff training. When you have staff working in the manufacturing facility, ensure that they have been trained to eliminate waste, recycle, and practice good sense in this area. Sometimes, improving something simple, like communication, can reduce waste.

2. Shipping

More often, consumers are choosing products that have environmentally friendly shipping options. Interestingly, many are willing to spend more money if it means a shipping option that is nicer to our planet.

Whether your customers are strictly in the US or around the world, speak to the shipping companies you use to get a better idea of how they operate behind the scenes. Many companies are now offering green solutions including DPD Total Zero and DHL GoGreen. Partnering with a service like this often becomes a selling point.

We should note that there is a point at which the extra charge for green shipping becomes too much. If the charge is more than 5% of the product’s value, you might find consumers going for free shipping regardless of the implications.

3. Deliveries and Returns

Thirdly, customers are also acknowledging the delivery and return procedures of companies these days. There are many steps you can take to prevent several journeys just to deliver one package:

• Allow customers to choose a time slot when they will be home
• Encourage customers to set up alternative delivery options (this could be leaving a parcel in a prearranged spot or with a neighbor)
• Reroute all deliveries to a pack station

With the first two steps, the customer should be home to accept the delivery or have a plan in place if they aren’t home. Then, the third option ensures that the environmental impact of a failed delivery is less.

Similarly, managing returns is a team effort between the customer and the business. As a business, it’s your job to provide accurate information in product descriptions. If the description is inaccurate, customers will buy the product under false pretenses and a return is almost certain. Explain colors and sizes accurately and think about creating videos for products so consumers get a good look before ordering.

Why Does Brand Sustainability Matter?

2020 has been a difficult year, to say the least, and we need to prioritize our focus for the rest of the year (especially those with reduced resources). Why should you focus on brand sustainability?

• Get Customer Support — Customers want sustainable brands and are actively searching for them. Without attention to this area, you could get left behind.
• Reduce Costs — With improvements to packaging, deliveries, returns, and shipping, most businesses are actually able to save money while focusing on sustainability.
• Improve Brand Image — Since customers care, you’ll experience more traction with sustainable business practices. You’re one of them and it creates a sense of community around the whole brand.
• Prepare for the Future — As the whole country pushes towards reduced waste and carbon emissions, it makes sense to get ahead while you can.
• Boost Staff Retention — Let’s not forget, your employees are also customers of other brands; they want your business to improve sustainability efforts too. When you do this, they’ll feel proud to work for your company.
• Improve Work Environment — Finally, you can also improve the work environment for staff. With something simple like cleaning products, you remove the dangerous chemicals and choose a plant-based solution instead.

Getting Started with Brand Sustainability

Ultimately, your business’s response to sustainability concerns will depend on your service. However, no matter your size or business type, there are things you can do to contribute to the effort.

In the past, we’ve seen businesses launch a brand new ‘sustainable, green, amazing, unbelievable’ product, but this just isn’t going to work any longer. Rather than starting with something new, try to overhaul something that already exists. Think about the core aspects of your business and improvements that can be in the name of sustainability. Often, improvement opportunities are spotted with production, the supplier of materials, manufacturing, packaging, and other areas.

After updating products, change descriptions online and consider a reinvention with product labels. Using social media and PPC ads, you could even generate excitement with the re-release of popular products that are now more sustainable.

As a business, it’s normal to worry about the cost to the consumer. Yet, consumers are always willing to spend more when the value increases. If you can offer more value, the pricing doesn’t matter (as long as you aren’t in the ‘extortionate’ range!).

Furthermore, we believe that every good sustainability strategy has an element of education. Again, focusing a business on beating the competition is often ineffective. This is certainly an element, but it’s more effective to put the customer first. Educate people about sustainability and why your latest effort improves the value of your service. Rather than making one change, commit to a new lifestyle and get customers to help in your mission.

Conclusion

Brand sustainability matters, and it’s still a feature rising in prominence despite the pandemic that we’ve all experienced in 2020. In fact, efforts have ramped up even more due to the unfortunate need to reverse to some one-use plastics in the medical world.

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