How brands are successfully communicating their sustainability efforts — and how their stakeholders are asserting their own needs and preferences
Electricity and gas company E.ON Energy has launched a new campaign in hopes of challenging the norms in the utilities sector and exploring what can be done differently. The first ad shows Barcelona’s city streets transformed into a giant swimming pool that is heated by E.ON’s air source heat pumps. This E.ON technology has already heated an Olympic-sized swimming pool by harnessing energy in the air, combined with electricity. The ad, of course, imagines this technology’s capabilities on a much larger scale.
World Wildlife Fund (WWF) is challenging the marketing industry to use its influence to help deliver a more sustainable future with the launch of Project Extraordinary, a global video challenge that will see creative agencies produce short films to demonstrate how sustainability can be desirable and sexy.
Over the past fourteen years, photographer Ashley Cooper amassed the world’s single largest collection of images documenting the impacts of climate change and renewable energy projects around the world, which have just been published in a book entitled Images From a Warming Planet. Jonathon Porritt, who wrote the foreword for the book, called it “An extraordinary collection of images and a powerful call to action.” Here, Cooper recounts the highs, lows and lessons learned during his journey.
At a moment when the world is beginning to more fully acknowledge the power and voice of women, big name brands and organizations are using their influence — and some creative marketing — to shed light on issues such as the gender pay gap and the lack of opportunities for women in STEM.
Air New Zealand has uncovered a unique way to use its global reach to spark a conversation around climate change. In partnership with Antarctica New Zealand and the New Zealand Antarctic Research Institute, the airline has created a new safety video that showcases the frozen continent and highlights the important climate and environmental science taking place there.
In a bid to increase responsible shipping practices, Forum for the Future and the Sustainable Shipping Initiative have launched the Ship Recycling Transparency Initiative (SRTI). The Initiative brings together key industry stakeholders to improve transparency in the global ship recycling value chain by facilitating voluntary disclosure of recycling practices and related data by ship owners, and to support the use of this information to inform decision-making.
This is the fourth in a series of articles examining how business leaders and companies can transform their corporate culture in order to succeed in the midst of the impending Purpose Revolution. Find links to the full series below.
Companies are investing in corporate responsibility programs with the goal of making a positive contribution to the communities and environments in which they operate. Successful corporate responsibility programs emphasize engagement with various stakeholders, including customers, partners, governments, and employees. In today's changing communications landscape, stakeholders have an important role in shaping these programs. Stakeholder engagement is critical to the shared success of corporate responsibility programs. It is time that companies take a fresh look at how to engage with these individuals to arrive at common goals and maximize collective resources.
You’ve probably read the proliferation of literature about the benefits of hiring purpose-driven employees, which can result in increased productivity, higher retention rates, and more effective collaboration, just to name a few. But have you ever wondered how purpose-driven employees impact your organization’s branding and marketing?
A first-of-its-kind research project led by Microfinance Opportunities (MFO) in partnership with Fashion Revolution and C&A Foundation gives the most comprehensive picture yet of the living and working conditions faced by female garment workers in Bangladesh, Cambodia and India.
In response to growing demand for sustainable apparel products, Kering and London College of Fashion, UAL (LCF) are launching the world’s first open-access digital course in luxury fashion and sustainability.
Back in the early days of corporate philanthropy, companies typically selected causes to support based on the personal interests of the chairman — or the chairman’s wife! — with little or no regard to issues of strategy, relevance or impact. Fortunately, things have moved on, with many companies now adopting more innovative, imaginative and considered approaches to their companies’ community involvement activities — such that in many cases they can no longer be understood as purely ‘philanthropic’.
Confronted with an ever-growing demand for transparency and materiality, companies need to find an adequate format to publish both financial and pre-financial information to their stakeholders in an effective way. While traditional reporting reaches its limits, online integrated reporting features a number of key advantages that enable them to get the job done. It is fair to say that 2017 was an important year for corporate reporting. A number of events established the disclosure of relevant ecological, social and governance (ESG) specific data as the “new normal”:
In a bid to build trust into our systems and society, Unilever has announced a new commitment to cut investment in platforms that breed division in society — and is challenging the rest of the industry to do the same. In his keynote speech at the IAB Annual Leadership Meeting in Palm Desert, Calif., Keith Weed, Unilever’s CMO, demanded the industry work together to improve transparency and rebuild consumer trust in an era of fake news and toxic online content.
Building on the success of its “Good Odds” spots released during the Super Bowl, in which it highlighted the real-life story of Canadian Para-alpine skier Lauren Woolstencroft, auto giant Toyota has released a new ad campaign “Start Your Impossible” for the Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games PyeongChang 2018.
This is the second in a series of articles examining how business leaders and companies can transform their corporate culture in order to succeed in the midst of the impending Purpose Revolution. Find links to the full series below.
Absolut is leading the way for transparency with a new campaign that proves that it really is ‘the vodka with nothing to hide.’ The Åhus, Sweden-based distiller has created a short film that takes viewers on a revealing journey to discover Absolut Vodka’s CO2 neutral distillation process and sustainable ethos.
In my book, Rise Up: How to Build a Socially Conscious Company, I made a number of predictions about the future, ranging from the rise of women to a more equitable and influential role in the workplace to the growth of worker collectives, such as co-ops and employee-owned companies, in the marketplace. I also predicted that ratings systems would proliferate in every walk of life, from companies to cities to individuals:
It was a sad Super Bowl. Sad, as only Trump can say it. Saaad. One minute I had a cunning, fast-talking clown trying to sell me stuff in true ad-land fashion. The next, I felt emotionally mistreated by a sobbing stranger playing curling with my heart. Corporate America appeared not to care at all — and if it did, it cared too much — which is exactly the problem. Of four quarters of fast-paced commercials only around 10 aimed for something bigger than product plugging.
The UN Climate Change secretariat is launching an online portal that invites countries, businesses, local government and civil society to contribute to the climate change conversation. The platform will support the Talanoa Dialogue, an international conversation mechanism launched during COP23 in Bonn, which will help track progress on current commitments and drive global climate action.