The latest products, services, design approaches and business models that are helping organizations of all sizes deliver on their sustainability ambitions and establish a new business as usual.
To prepare for this year's Sustainable Brands Innovation Open (SBIO) competition, we're catching up with some of our favorite entrepreneurial ventures from competitions past ...
According to eMarketer, online apparel and accessories is the fastest growing category of online sales among nine major categories.
Calling all innovators and implementers! In March 2013, Sustainable Brands will launch a new “Issues in Focus” editorial package, including daily features, interviews and case studies on the circular economy as a driver of business model innovation and social good.The Issue in FocusYou can't get a soy latte these days without hearing the words collaborative consumption, the circular economy, crade-to-cradle or the sharing economy. But how are these quasi-utopian concepts becoming real? What implications could they have for the future of business and the economy?
Modular carpet company Interface launched a new competition this week inviting architects, designers and students to submit visions for how nature can influence the design of a new or existing space, both within built environments or outside.
The Ellen MacArthur Foundation today launched the Circular Economy 100 (CE100), a three-year program aimed at bringing together a network of 100 leading companies globally to facilitate development and commitment to new circular economy projects. The CE100 will provide executive education on key themes and emerging trends, share knowledge and new learnings, and identify and develop solutions to common challenges. The objective is that by 2015 participating companies will have triggered circular initiatives that will result in an aggregated economic benefit of $10bn for the businesses involved.
Seventeen years ago, Indigenous cofounders Scott Leonard and Matt Reynolds were picking burs out of hand-knit South American sweaters before delivering them to The Nature Company.
Is there such a thing as sustainable consumption? A new study by BBMG, GlobeScan and SustainAbility finds that a majority of consumers across six international markets are seeking to reconcile their desire for shopping and style with responsibility to the environment and society through their purchases.
Unilever, the UK’s largest deodorant manufacturer, unveiled a new product design that could make the category significantly more sustainable.
A team from Seymourpowell, one of the UK’s most established design and innovation consultancies, were thrilled to spend an evening in the company of a select group of motivated Design & Technology teachers, at the recent Tunbridge Wells Teardown Lab led by the Ellen Macarthur Foundation. It proved a fascinating evening of new insight and practical hands-on learning.
This article first appeared on edie.net on January 28, 2013.Industrial systems based on circular economy models will be constrained by end-of-life material availability, limiting future improvements in process efficiency, scientists claim. A wider materials efficiency framework is required, they argue — one which encompasses not just circular resource flow systems but mitigation options for industrial carbon emissions and consumer demand.
Outdoor apparel company Patagonia is working to restore grasslands in its namesake region of Argentina through a partnership with The Nature Conservancy and Ovis XXI, an Argentine company working to improve the economic, environmental, social and human sustainability of the sheep-based supply chain.
Three global automakers have signed an agreement to jointly develop a fuel cell system to power zero-emissions vehicles.
The consumer goods industry could save $700 billion in materials alone through the adoption of a circular economy, according to a new report by the Ellen MacArthur Foundation. The report also details how land productivity and supply chain stabilitydesigning products so they can be recycled or reabsorbed into the biosphere without toxic residuals.
The Center for Resource Solutions (CRS) announced Wednesday that Kendall-Jackson and parent company Jackson Family Wines, based in Santa Rosa, CA, have joined Green-e® Marketplace after purchasing 36,000 megawatt-hours of Green‑e Energy-Certified renewable energy certificates from NativeEnergy. The purchase covers 100 percent of the total annual electricity needs for Kendall-Jackson's U.S.-based operations. By participating in Green‑e Marketplace, Kendall-Jackson can now display the Green‑e logo to inform its customers of its commitment to clean, renewable energy.
Your favorite t-shirt is made from more than cotton and memories.One key ingredient that doesn’t show up on your shirt’s label is water. Amazingly, it can take 2,700 liters to produce the cotton needed to make a single t-shirt.
Zeronauts: Breaking the Sustainability Barrier by John Elkington, EarthScan, London; Routledge, New York, 2012
Smoking kills. That shouldn’t come as much of a brow-raiser. But did you know that in most parts of the world, it’s not necessarily tar, nicotine and carcinogens that are leading to early deaths? It’s smoke.
This post first appeared in Grist on January 8, 2013.LEDs are already much more efficient than any other light bulb out there, but a group of scientists figured out how to make them a whopping 55 percent more efficient — by looking at fireflies.
This channel will examine business model innovation.
In an effort to increase customer adoption of reusable cups, Starbucks is rolling out a new low-cost reusable tumbler this week, according to reports.The plastic cups will be roughly the same size and appearance as the company’s paper cups and will cost $1. Starbucks will give a 10 cents discount to customers using the cups, so the cost is recouped after 10 uses.