responsible brands | Eric Block On Responsible Branding

Turning problem sea algae into a replacement for plastic

25 01 2023

Mari Granström, a biochemist, sources microalgae from the Baltic Sea and seaweed from the Caribbean. Photo: BBC News

By Jo Harper fro BBC News • Reposted: January 25, 2023

Excessive outbreaks of seaweed and microalgae are clogging up waters from the Caribbean to the Baltic. Now both are being harvested alongside farmed crops to create ingredients for cosmetics and food products.

Mari Granström says it was her passion for scuba diving that opened her eyes to the continuing problem of toxic microalgae blooms in the Baltic Sea.

The outbreaks occur when tiny cyanobacteria, also called blue-green algae, suddenly multiply rapidly, stretching out on top of the water for potentially kilometres.

Also called eutrophication, it is a form of marine suffocation, and it is a significant environmental concern in the Baltic Sea. It can occur in 97% of the total area of the sea, according to official figures.

The blooms impact on other marine life, by causing oxygen deficiency, reducing water quality, and blocking out light.

A microalgae bloom in the Baltic Sea — *Microalgae blooms can plague the Baltic Sea, particularly in the summer. Photo: BBC*

The problem is caused by too many nutrients entering the water, typically nitrogen and phosphorus from artificial fertilisers. These are carried into the sea by the rivers of the surrounding countries – Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Russia and Sweden.

While the use of such fertilisers has reduced in recent years, the Baltic Marine Environment Protection Commission, the intergovernmental organisation that aims to improve water quality in the sea, says “the effect of these measures has not yet been detected”.

Some six years ago Ms Granström, a Finnish biochemist, determined to tackle the problem herself. She’d harvest the microalgae and use it to make ingredients for a host of products. In addition to cosmetics and human food, the microalgae extracts can be used in detergents, animal feed, packaging, and even as a replacement for plastic.

This comes as there is a growing trend for seaweed to be harvested for such purposes, as a replacement to oil-based ingredients.

Extracts from blue-green algae — *Origin by Ocean produces numerous extracts from the microalgae. Photo: BBC*

“I saw with my own eyes – or perhaps couldn’t see – how it was affecting the marine ecosystem, and decided to do something,” she says. “There was too much finger pointing and not enough action.”

Ms Granström says she worked on the project as “a hobby for a long time”, before in 2019 setting up a company called Origin by Ocean (ObO). She is the chief executive.

The business, which has attracted both commercial investment and European Union funds, is now continuing with a pilot production scheme ahead of aiming to be fully operational by 2025-26.

ObO collects the microalgae off the coast of Finland, where it is sucked on to boats and then separated from the water. The firm is also importing invasive sargassum seaweed from the Dominican Republic in the Caribbean.

ObO staff harvesting blue-green algae — *The algae is harvested by sucking it out of the sea. Photo: BBC*

Vast blooms of that seaweed have plagued that region for a number of years.“There are 25 million tonnes of sargassum blooming in the Caribbean every year,” says Ms Granström.

“It stops people fishing and harms tourism. We are now buying several tonnes of sargassum from the Dominican Republic, and this volume will increase.”

The company further sources unwanted seaweed from Portuguese and Spanish waters.

ObO’s pilot processing is done at a facility in northern Finland. It uses a patented biorefinery technology it calls “Nauvu” to separate the algae into numerous useable materials.

These are then sold to food, cosmetics, textiles, packing and agricultural companies.

To help grow the business ObO is working with one of its investors, Finnish chemicals and industrial group Kiilto. “If this can be successfully scaled up here, then ObO can replicate similar processes around the globe,” says Ville Solja, Kiilto’s chief business development officer.

ObO already has plans to set up a refinery in the Dominican Republic.

Across in Sweden, a separate business called Nordic Seafarm is showing just how versatile seaweed can be.

“We make algae-based gin and beer, both locally produced,” says director Fredrik Gröndahl.

Nordic Seafarm, which grows its own seaweed, is a commercial spin-off from Seafarm, a Swedish government-funded project that helps commercialise aquaculture research.

“If this market [for seaweed] gets big, and we think it will, we are ready to scale up,” adds Prof Gröndahl, who is also project leader of Seafarm, and head of department for sustainable development, environmental science and engineering at the KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm.

“Just imagine if Ikea asked for algae-based meatballs globally, which could happen.”

*Professor Fredrik Gröndahl helps to run a company that puts seaweed to various uses. Photo: BBC News*

Prof Gröndahl also hopes that in the future algae will become a key ingredient in animal feed, to replace environmentally-damaging fish meal, which is common in pigs and poultry diets. “Algae is also cheaper than existing ingredients as there is no cost for feeding and irrigation.”

Back at ObO, Ms Granström says the aim is for shoppers around the world to “play a part in cleaning up the Baltic Sea” by simply buying a number of consumer products.

“We wanted to do something to help at both ends of the process, upstream and downstream, as it were – cleaning the seas, but also monetising a change in consumer behaviour.”

To see the original post, follow this link: https://www.bbc.com/news/business-64317261

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Tags: corporate social reponsibility, corporate social responsibility, Nordic Seafarm, responsible brands, sargassum, seaweed, sustainability, toxic microalgae
Categories : sustainable brands

Politics and Purpose: The US Consumer Response to Purpose-Driven Marketing Across the Political Spectrum

23 01 2023

By Eric Block • Posted: January 23, 2023

In a landmark research report published by Sustainable Life Media, Maddie Kulkarni of PepsiCo reports on the response to Purpose Driven Marketing by groups who self-identify as Democrats, Republican or Independent Voters.

In the report, Kulkarni writes:

“As a marketer, given the high drama of the US midterm elections this November, and the recent criticism of “woke marketing” by some activists and politicians, I wanted to investigate how consumers felt about brands engaging in purpose-driven marketing. Purpose-driven marketing — also known as “sustainability marketing” or “social impact marketing” — speaks to a brand’s attempt to engage its consumers on a social or environmental issue. I wondered: Does identifying with a certain political party influence whether consumers think more highly or more disapprovingly of a brand taking on a cause?

To find out, I turned to data gathered from consumers’ reactions to about 50 purpose-driven advertising campaigns tested with over 25,000 consumers in the last two years through the Sustainable Brands®’ (SB) Ad Sustainability Awareness Platform (ASAP) insights tool. Developed in 2020 when several global brands came together under the SB Brands for Good initiative, the ASAP tool was designed to create a way to measure (across industries and with a standardized set of metrics) how effective purpose-driven advertising campaigns were in driving consumer behavior change around environmental and social issues.”

The key findings in the report included the following:

• Democrats have a significantly more favorable opinion of a brand after seeing its sustainability campaign, over Republicans and Independents.

• There are similarities and differences in the sustainability issues Democrats and Republicans most care about.

• US women like seeing brands that support women.

• Sustainability campaigns are currently most resonating with Millennials.

• Targeted cohorts appreciate a brand’s effort to reach them; though with the Hispanic cohort, there is room to improve ad effectiveness.

• Environmentally focused ads score higher on Effectiveness than socially focused ads.

In summarizing key insights that effective marketers approach to communication, Kulkarni reports the following conclusions:

What are the implications from this research for the marketing industry?

We can use the insights of this research to create strategic media plans that are responsible and take on a social impact lens. At a minimum, our ads need to be accurate, honest and respectful — this is a basic requirement. But by understanding our target consumers, we can not only create content that resonates with them and helps them feel seen; we can also leverage media’s targeting abilities to deliver our content to an audience that normally would not be exposed to it. This would be an effort to develop understanding across people of different backgrounds and help a broader audience “see another side.” Note this strategy might come with some risk if the “other side” does not agree with your point of view; it is best to prepare for this possibility.
To drive creative ad effectiveness around sustainability storytelling, we should continue to focus on Influence, Credibility, Actionability and Talkability metrics. Demonstrating Influence and garnering Credibility with a campaign comes from research, engaging with partners, and spending meaningful time and resources on a cause. Creating an Actionable campaign comes from being clear on how consumers can use our productsto lead more sustainable lifestyles. And Talkability, the notion that people want to share and talk about the campaign, comes from campaigns having a creative spark that surprises and delights the consumer.
Given that our creative ad effectiveness scores are generally lower on socially focused behaviors than on environmentally focused behaviors, we should study how we can improve storytelling when it comes to the former.
We can study how different generational cohorts connect with sustainability issues, so we can develop content that resonates with each group’s unique life stage.

To read the original research findings, follow this link to the Sustainable Life Media report here:https://sustainablebrands.com/read/marketing-and-comms/politics-and-purpose-the-us-consumer-response-to-purpose-driven-marketing-across-the-political-spectrum

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Tags: advertising effectiveness, attitudes toward environmental and social messaging, corporate social reponsibility, corporate social responsibility, CSR, purpose driven marketing, responsible brands, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands
Categories : sustainable brands

Energy Efficiency: A Co-Benefit to Disaster Risk Reduction

22 01 2023

Damage caused by Hurricane Ida to homes in Pointe-aux-Chenes in Terrebonne Parish, La. (FEMA photo by Julie Joseph)

By Natalie Enclade from Homeland Security Today. Reposted: January 21, 2023

While we continue to learn lessons from recent natural hazards and their impact on critical infrastructure—like the electric grid and water systems—we are moving toward an environment of increased understanding and acceptance of modern sustainability and resilience concepts.

Case studies out of Florida in the aftermath of Hurricane Ian provide evidence that individuals and communities were kept safe through the strength of their homes and the infrastructure that provided critical resources and services in those affected areas. Any national discussion of reducing damage from natural disasters, climate events, and protecting the environment must include disaster-resilient and sustainable construction and infrastructure. It does not need to be an “either/or” choice.

Many communities facing current known hazards still haven’t adopted modern hazard-resistant codes, despite the expectation that natural hazards will increase in frequency and severity in the years ahead. Between the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act and the Inflation Reduction Act, energy codes saw a $1.25 billion investment at a time when FEMA is providing less than $2 million annually to support resilient codes through its hazard mitigation grant programs. Without strong codes and standards, infrastructure will sustain avoidable damage, unable to realize climate benefits if they are damaged or destroyed because they were not constructed to withstand hazard risk.

Critical infrastructure failures are a climate risk multiplier. Research has demonstrated how dramatically the impact of hurricanes/tropical cyclones may increase over time, due to compound effects of changes in storms and heatwaves. These infrastructure failures drive compounding hazards and life and safety impacts. An example of this dramatic impact was seen in Puerto Rico after Hurricane Fiona where over 100,000 people were still without power weeks after the storm made landfall, while the heat indices rose above 100 degrees. It is also important to note that “excessive heat during an extended power outage” was the cause of most deaths in Louisiana after Hurricane Ida, not the immediate impact of the storm.

Loss of electric service can also adversely impact other critical lifeline infrastructure systems, such as wastewater treatment and water transmission and distribution. Furthermore, power outages and compound hazards can significantly disrupt local business and supply chains, leading to secondary losses, and the enhanced connectivity of local and global economics potentially would further foster the impact.

Energy efficiency and decarbonization can lead to co-benefits in disaster risk reduction. Disaster after disaster we see over and over again that the most at-risk communities are least likely to be able to evacuate, so making it safer to shelter in place and reduce emissions (e.g., better insulation to maintain interior temperatures when the power grid goes down) should be a priority.

In conclusion, while contemplating energy efficiency, we must enhance disaster resilience across the nation through measures that would effectuate these policy ideals, changes in authority, development of incentives, and streamlining of assistance to serve our communities in an equitable and transformational way.

To see the original post, follow this link: https://www.hstoday.us/featured/energy-efficiency-a-co-benefit-to-disaster-risk-reduction/

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Tags: accountability, energy efficiency, ESG, FEMA, homeland security, natural disasters, responsible brands, sustainability
Categories : sustainable brands

Business management doesn’t always have to be about capitalism – this course shows how it can also be a calling

22 01 2023

By Andrew J. Hoffman, Professor of Management & Organizations; Professor of Environment & Sustainability; Professor of Sustainable Enterprise at the Ross School of Business and School of Environment and Sustainability, University of Michigan from The Conversation • Reposted: January 22, 2023

Uncommon Courses is an occasional series from The Conversation U.S. highlighting unconventional approaches to teaching.

Title of Course:

“Management as a Calling”

What prompted the idea for the course?

The idea for this course came from my frustration that business schools do not do enough to create successful business leaders with a desire to serve society. All too often, we simply drop an ethics or sustainability elective into a curriculum that puts profits over people – and gives short shrift to big issues such as climate change and income inequality.

So I thought we should develop a course that helps students examine their own ethics, values and purpose. As I point out in my book, rather than simply imparting knowledge, this course helps students develop wisdom. Rather than treating management as a precise science, it adds the liberal arts. I want students to examine their own conscience and decide what kind of a manager they are meant to be, what kind of career they aspire to have and what kind of legacy they hope to leave.

What does the course explore?

This course helps undergraduate and graduate business majors consider their career as a calling. Ungraded, its core centers on three weekend retreats where students leave their cellphones behind, join others with similar aspirations and examine their unique purpose in life.

The retreats take place at the start and end of their final year of study, and one year after graduation. They involve exercises, readings, collaboration and quiet reflection. At the end, students write a personal mission statement and a plan for fulfilling it.

There are also lectures on the notion of a calling, which for this course I define as a purpose that people truly believe in and will dedicate themselves to wholeheartedly, without qualm or self-interest.

Why is this course relevant now?

When I started teaching business in the mid-1990s, students who wanted to improve the world typically studied government or nonprofit management. Today, many are coming to business school with a sense of purpose to make a positive change.

Unfortunately, business education has not done a good job, in my opinion, of accommodating this demand. Curricula focus far too much on the “how” of business and not enough on the “why.” But if we don’t change that, we will continue to have corporate transgressions like tax avoidance, labor exploitationand fraud, where short-term profit goals are placed above responsibilities to society.

What’s a critical lesson from the course?

We study what a calling is, techniques for examining each student’s individual calling, and tactics for staying on course. My hope is that students will cultivate a sense of passion and vision in their careers and apply the power of business to address society’s challenges, whether that be equitable pay structures, innovations to reduce or eliminate carbon emissions, collaborations to support government’s role in the market and new definitions of the role of the corporation in serving the interests of all in society.

What materials does the course feature?

“Man’s Search for Meaning” by Viktor E. Frankl.

“Life on Purpose” by Victor J. Strecher.

Articles by Parker Palmer, Herbert Shepard, David Foster-Wallace, Deb Meyersonand others.

What will the course prepare students to do?

This course will help students develop a vision of what a calling is, what their calling is and a desire to make its pursuit a lifelong goal. Rather than thinking only in terms of a job, I hope students will imagine the role they want to play in business to create a future that serves not just shareholders, but all of society – employees, customers, the community and the world.

To see the original post, follow this link: https://theconversation.com/business-management-doesnt-always-have-to-be-about-capitalism-this-course-shows-how-it-can-also-be-a-calling-191837

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Tags: accountability, corporate social responsibility, CSR, Life Purpose, responsible brands, sustainability
Categories : sustainable brands

What does ESG mean? Two business scholars explain what environmental, social and governance standards and principles are

21 01 2023

Graphic: Kiplinger

By Luciana Echazú, Associate Dean of Undergraduate Education; Associate Professor of Economics, University of New Hampshire and Diego C. Nocetti, Dean, School of Business; Professor of Economics and Financial Studies, Clarkson University

Environmental, social and governance business standards and principles, often referred to as ESG, are becoming both more commonplace and controversial. But what does “ESG” really mean?

It’s shorthand for the way that many corporations operate in accordance with the belief that their long-term survival and their ability to generate profits require accounting for the impact their decisions and actions have on the environment, society as a whole and their own workforce.

These practices grew out of long-standing efforts to make businesses more socially and environmentally responsible. ESG investing, sometimes called sustainable investment, also takes these considerations into account.

Zeroing in on the E, S and G

ESG priorities vary widely, but there are some common themes.

These priorities usually emphasize environmental sustainability – the E in ESG – with a focus on contributing to efforts to slow the pace of climate change.

There’s also an effort to uphold high ethical standards through corporate operations. These social concerns – the S – can include, for example, ensuring that a company doesn’t buy goods and services from exploitative suppliers, or treats its employees well. Or it might entail taking care to hire and retain a diverse workforce and taking steps to reduce social injustices in the communities where a corporation operates.

Companies embracing ESG principles should also have high-quality governance– the G. Governance includes oversight, handled by a competent and qualified board of directors, regarding the hiring and firing of top corporate leaders, executive compensation and any dividends paid to shareholders.

Governance also pertains to whether a company’s leadership operates fairly and responsibly, with transparency and accountability.

Why ESG matters

By 2026, the total amount invested globally according to these principles will nearly double to US$34 trillion from $18.4 trillion in 2021, the accounting firm PwC estimates. However, increasing scrutiny of which investments really qualify as ESG could mean it takes longer to reach that volume.

This corporate concept is becoming a political touchstone in the U.S. because some states, like Florida and Kentucky, arguing that these practices divert from the focus on maximizing profits and can be detrimental to investors by making other considerations a priority, have barred their pension funds from using ESG principles as part of their investment considerations. Some very large asset managers, including BlackRock, aren’t allowed to work with those pension funds anymore.

Many of the arguments against embracing these principles hold that they reduce profits by taking other factors into account. But how do ESG practices affect financial performance?

A team of New York University scholars looked at the results of 1,000 different studies that had sought to answer this question. It found mixed results: Some of the studies found that ESG principles increased returns, others found that they weakened performance, and a third group determined that these principles made no difference at all.

It’s possible that the disparities among results could be due largely to the lack of clarity regarding what counts and does not count as ESG, which has been a long-standing discussion and makes it hard to assess how ESG investments perform.

The NYU scholars also found two consistent results regarding ESG strategies. First, they help protect investors against risks such as losses resulting from the failure of a supply chain due to environmental or geopolitical issues, and they can protect companies from volatility during periods of economic instability and downturns. Second, investors and companies benefit more from ESG strategies in the long term than in the short term.

To see the original post, follow this link: https://theconversation.com/what-does-esg-mean-two-business-scholars-explain-what-environmental-social-and-governance-standards-and-principles-are-196768

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Tags: accountability, corporate social reponsibility, corporate social responsibility, CSR, ESG, responsible brands, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands
Categories : sustainable brands

CEOs Know ‘Business-As-Usual’ Isn’t Working, But Many Are Too Tapped Out to Change

21 01 2023

Image credits: Marvin Meyer and Ryoji Iwata via Unsplash

Executives view climate change as both a short- and long-term threat, but most are failing to address it proactively, PwC CEO Survey shows. By Mary Mazzoni from Triplepundit.com • Reposted: January 21, 2023

We’ve heard it for years — “business-as-usual isn’t working” — and the annual PwC CEO Survey indicates executives are well aware. Nearly 40 percent of more than 4,000 responding global CEOs think their companies will no longer be economically viable in a decade if they continue down their current path.

That’s a pretty big deal. Yet while one would think such a grim consensus would spur an immediate push for change, many executives told PwC they don’t have nearly enough time to think and talk about the future. Maintaining current operating performance consumed the biggest share of CEOs’ time last year, according to the survey, and executives admitted they’d rather spend more time evolving their companies’ strategies to meet future demands.

Findings like these reflect the “dual imperative” facing CEOs around the world as they look to reinvent their businesses for the future while navigating a laundry list of daunting challenges in the present day, the PwC CEO Survey found. “If organizations are not only to thrive but survive the next few years, they must carefully balance the dual imperative of mitigating short-term risks and operational demands with long-term outcomes — as businesses that don’t transform, won’t be viable,” Bob Moritz, global chairman of PwC, said in a statement.

So, will business leaders act to save themselves, or will they be too busy with next quarter’s P&L? Let’s take a closer look inside the survey to see what executives are saying — and what it could mean for the future.

Executives view climate change as both a short- and long-term threat, but most are failing to address it proactively, PwC CEO Survey shows

While managing climate risk is a long-term challenge that continues to vex executives, the PwC CEO Survey indicates many are also concerned about the effects of climate change in the here and now.

Most of the CEOs surveyed expect their businesses to feel some degree of impact from climate change within the next 12 months. About half predict the effects of climate change will have a “moderate,” “large” or “very large” impact on their cost profiles. More than 40 percent anticipate impacts to their supply chains, while around a quarter are worried about climate-related damage to their physical assets.

Their concerns are warranted: The 10 most significant climate-related disasters to strike the world last year caused more than $3 billion worth of damage each, according to the World Economic Forum.

Still, the way they respond could use some work. “Deeper statistical analysis of the survey shows that the CEOs who feel most exposed to climate change are more likely to take action to address it,” PwC researchers observed.

“This kind of reactive approach is understandable — when your house is in the path of a forest fire, you reach for the hose — but it creates risks of its own,” they continued. “Combating climate change requires a coordinated, long-term plan. It won’t be solved if the only companies working on it are those that face immediate financial impact.”

Beyond issues with reactivity, the researchers underscore that they “don’t know how much” the actions most often taken by businesses — such as decarbonization initiatives and moves to innovate more climate-friendly products and services — “will move the needle, particularly in the near-term, which, in light of emissions already in the atmosphere, promises continued warming under virtually every scenario.”

While it remains murky if business actions will do anything to curb their climate risk in the short term, the researchers warn that many long-term corporate climate strategies are also incomplete or less effective than they could be — setting the stage for even more serious risk in the years to come.

More than half of all CEOs surveyed, including 70 percent of those at U.S. companies, say their teams have no plans to apply an internal carbon price to decision-making, “even though doing so could help them account for considerations like taxes and incentives, and clarify strategic trade-offs,” the researchers found. Many are also dropping the ball on reporting, as another recent PwC survey found that 87 percent of global investors think corporate reporting contains unsubstantiated sustainability claims, often referred to as “greenwashing.”

CEOs predict declining global economic growth, but is that really a bad thing?

Nearly three-quarters (73 percent) of CEOs believe global economic growth will decline over the next 12 months. This is a marked departure from recent years, as more than 75 percent of respondents to the 2020 and 2021 iterations of the PwC CEO Survey said they thought economic growth would improve. It’s also the most pessimistic CEOs have been regarding global economic growth since the PwC CEO Survey began asking this question 12 years ago.

This comes as no major shock, as other recent polling indicates CEOs around the world are bracing for a recession in 2023. Still, it begs a few questions: Is a slowdown in economic growth inevitable, and is it even a bad thing?

In the decades since economist Milton Friedman declared that the social responsibility of business is to increase profits for shareholders, conventional reason has dictated that the ultimate marker of business health is to grow bigger and bigger every year, with solid shareholder returns that climb on a quarterly basis.

Yet study after study indicates that the never-ending pursuit of more consumption, more profit and more money does not equate to better quality of life across the economy — and the spoils of rugged capitalism are not shared equally. In the U.S., for example, CEO pay has grown by a staggering 1,460 percent since 1978, while median worker pay has not even kept pace with inflation, increasing by a mere 18 percent over the same period. U.S. CEOs were paid 399 times as much as a typical worker in 2021.

So, if the dogged pursuit of “more, more, more” does not increase quality of life for the many, and workers by and large find themselves more wage-poor than their parents were, who really benefits from eternal economic growth as a marker of success? Even businesses stand to lose out as CEOs cash their bloated paychecks while predicting their companies will be belly-up within a decade.

Against a backdrop like this, it makes sense that conversations around degrowth are having a major moment in mainstream business circles. As the name implies, degrowth calls for intentional reductions in production and consumption to stay within the boundaries of a resource-constrained world — particularly in rich countries, allowing developing countries to have a greater share of the economic pie (and the global carbon budget).

While respondents to the PwC CEO Survey stop far short of advocating for strategic degrowth, they don’t plan to cope with the impending recession in the way many might expect. While over half of responding CEOs say they are moving to cut operating costs and raise prices, the majority (60 percent) say they do not plan to reduce the size of their workforce in the next 12 months, and 80 percent say they have no plans to reduce compensation.

Still, it makes sense that predictions about the worst recession in a century would be preoccupying for executives, but as Moritz of PwC observed, those that don’t keep the future in mind are destined for failure. This type of push and pull between long-term longevity and short-term profit is one that has defined conversations around stakeholder capitalism and corporate responsibility for as long as they’ve existed. Parsing through these survey responses, it could be that Mother Nature — and the markets — will finally force executives’ hands, pushing into fruition something that for decades was simply words.

To see the original post, follow this link. https://www.triplepundit.com/story/2023/pwc-ceo-survey-2023/764296

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Tags: CEOs, Climate Change, corporate social responsibility, CSR, ESG, marketing, responsible brands, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands
Categories : sustainable brands

Following layoffs, Amazon axes charity program amid wider cost-cutting moves

19 01 2023

The logo of Amazon is seen at a distribution center in Staten Island, N.Y. Amazon is ending a charity donation program it ran for a decade in its latest cost-cutting move. Photo: Angela Weiss | AFP via Getty Images 2020

From the Associated Press Posted: January 19. 2023

Amazon is ending a charity donation program it ran for a decade in its latest cost-cutting move.

In a blog post on Wednesday, the company said the program, called AmazonSmile, will shut down by February 20 because it had “not grown to create the impact” the retailer had hoped.

The program allowed Amazon to donate a small percentage of eligible purchases to a charity selected by shoppers.

“With so many eligible organizations—more than 1 million globally—our ability to have an impact was often spread too thin,” the company said.

The decision also comes as the Seattle-based company is laying off workers and axing different areas of its business in an effort to trim costs. Other tech companies, such as Facebook parent Meta and Salesforce, are also letting workers go after ramping up hiring over the past couple of years, when the pandemic made consumers increasingly reliant on the tech sector.

Amazon CEO Andy Jassy said earlier this month the layoffs at his company will impact about 18,000 employees. Jassy said the job cuts will mostly affect the company’s retail division and its PXT organizations, which handle human resources and other functions. Other teams, including the company’s Alexa division, have also faced layoffs since November.

The company said charities that have been a part of the AmazonSmile program will be provided a “one-time donation equivalent” to three months of what they earned last year through the program. They’ll also able to accrue additional donations until the program officially closes, it said.

Amazon noted in the blog post it will also continue supporting other charitable programs, such as its housing equity fund that aims to build more affordable homes.

To see the original post, follow this link. https://www.mprnews.org/story/2023/01/19/amazon-axes-charity-program-amid-wider-costcutting-moves

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Tags: Amazon, charity giving, corporate social responsibility, CSR, layoffs, responsible brands
Categories : sustainable brands

Why Macy’s and furniture companies are paying more attention to responsible sourcing

18 01 2023

Photo: Macy’s

By Melissa Daniels from Modern Retail • Reposted: January 18, 2022

In September 2022, Macy’s rolled out its first-ever wood-sourcing policy for its furniture sales after more than 150 years in business.

It requires the use of responsibly sourced wood or recycled or reclaimed materials. And it also prohibits the use of timber that has been harvested illegally or from threatened areas, among other restrictions. At the outset, the policy covers wood-based products in Macy’s private labels, while buyers will use the policy as a guide for onboarding new suppliers and brands.

“We’re really thinking about this policy first from the products that we own and buy, and where we can continue to expand it across our assortment,” said Keelin Evans, vice president of sustainability at Macy’s.

The policy follows Macy’s $5 billion commitment announced in March 2022 to become more sustainable in its policies and practices. It also rolled out a new cotton sourcing policy to ensure cotton isn’t harvested by underage workers or those in forced conditions.

But Macy’s is far from alone among furniture companies paying close attention to sourcing amid heightened consumer awareness against “fast furniture.” Wayfair, in October 2022, launched a new section to showcase products that meet sustainability certifications. And Crate and Barrel, in August 2022, put out a new sustainability policy that includes ensuring 60% of textiles are Certified Preferred Fibers by 2025.

Macy’s also doubled its score from 9 to 18 on the Sustainable Furnishings Council and National Wildlife Federation’s 2022 Wood Furniture Scorecard — it was among 37% of companies on the list that scored higher than they did the year before.

Part of what’s motivating brands is increasing recognition from shoppers about the environmental impact of production: the eco-friendly furniture market hit $43.26 billion in 2022 with an expected CAGR of 8.6% through 2030, per a recent Grand View Research report.

“Rising awareness among consumers towards sustainable production of furniture products has largely influenced the adoption of eco-friendly furniture in residential spaces,” the report said.

From a retailer’s perspective, though, getting more responsibly sourced materials can be an uphill battle. For example, Evans said that it took about two years to develop the wood policy. And it will take time to implement it across the brands’ product assortment.

“Furniture has long lead times. And sustainability is not about changing things necessarily overnight, but really working with your partners and your suppliers so that this can start to show up more and more,” Evans said.

Gaining access

Conor Coghlan, co-founder and CEO of Hoek Home, launched the DTC brand with the goal of creating easy-to-assemble furniture while minimizing the use of plastic waste. Products include side tables, desks, benches and chairs and Coghlan said the brand aims to keep the prices affordable as possible — a flat desk goes for $495, with a bundle that includes additional shelves for $795.

Some parts of its products use high density poly ethylene, which comes from recycled milk jugs. It also uses sustainably sourced plywood that’s Forest Stewardship Council-certified, indicating responsible sourcing.

One of the challenges with these materials, though, is reliable sourcing. When the brand launched as a Kickstarter in late 2020, there were a plethora of options, Coghlan said. But when supply chain issues kicked in during 2021, suppliers served larger clients first.

“For small companies who are ordering $8,000 or $10,000 worth of postconsumer [materials] instead of $800,000, they just weren’t answering our emails. So it got more difficult,” Coghlan said.

Hoek also aims to source as locally as possible, relying more on U.S-based manufacturers rather than foreign birch or materials. But that can put added cost on the product — and drive the price point higher for consumers.

Still, it’s a balance that Coghlan is willing to try to find in light of widespread concerns about climate change and environmental protection.

“I think it’s important, as we kind of grow up as businesses, that we just seem to be responsible and care for the environment and make the right, sustainable choices,” he said.

Manufacturing monitoring

With much production happening overseas, many furniture brands rely on third parties to monitor manufacturers and facilities.

Evans from Macy’s said the wood and cotton sourcing policies build on top of existing protocols. The brand regularly monitors its global supply chain with social compliance teams located throughout Asia.

It also relies on third-party auditors that visit factories every 18 months to ensure that suppliers and factories are adhering with the brand’s code of conduct, Evans said, particularly with regard to how workers are treated.

“When we actually identify issues with partners, we’re really all about remediation plans, corrective action plans, continuous improvement and working together,” she said. “So if we identify anything, we can make improvements and actually ensure that they’re having a better working experience and they’re being cared for.”

Barbora Samieian, co-founder of the Canadian DTC furniture brand Sundays, said the brand relies on site visits and quality control teams on the ground with its factories in China, Vietnam, India and Eastern Europe. Working with manufacturers that are using responsibly sourced products, though, typically means a higher price point for the end product. Sundays makes living, dining and bedroom furniture priced in the mid-range; its best-selling white oak Field dining table going for $2,190 while a four-piece sectional ranges from $4,670 to $5,180.

Sometimes, having a sustainability-first mind, it means there might be a product that doesn’t pass muster: for example, a recent stool design out of Europe was left out of a new collection because it did not meet California’s Proposition 65 environmental guidelines.

But sustainability at Sundays also means paying close attention the longevity of pieces, with a focus on designs that can fit with many aesthetics and are built with long-lasting materials like solid wood.

“We’d rather our customers have a fewer number of pieces that are sort of workhorse items in their homes that can be multipurpose, rather than expanding to huge numbers of SKUs,” she said.

But Sundays is wary of greenwashing, Samieian said. Much of the wood used in Sundays products is certified by the Forest Stewardship Council, which is a third-party nonprofit designation that ensures timber comes from responsibly managed forests. For it rugs, it relies on certifications from GoodWeave, which verifies products were made without child labor. Still, the brand is careful not to make too many claims for the purpose of marketing or wooing customers who are in the market for an eco-friendly product.

“We’re working really hard behind the scenes and with our partners and making strides and making progress,” she said. “We believe we have to do the right things first, then start talking about it.”

It also means being in a higher price bracket, Samieian said.

“We’ve really focused on solid wood and that’s more expensive and that means we have to play in a certain price point,” she said.

To see the original post, follow this link: https://www.modernretail.co/operations/why-macys-and-furniture-companies-are-paying-more-attention-to-responsible-sourcing/

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Tags: corporate social reponsibility, impact of production, responsible brands, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands, sustainable sourcing
Categories : sustainable brands

Apologies from Southwest Fall Flat Amid Lack of Purpose and Positive Change

17 01 2023

A logjam of Southwest 737s on December 27, 2022 at Santa Barbara Municipal Airport. On a typical day, there are six Southwest arrivals and 6 departures at Santa Barbara, and rarely more than one of the airline’s 737 at the airport at the same time. Photo: Glenn Beltz

By Riya Anne Polcastro from Triple Pundit • Reposted: January 17, 2023

Southwest is attempting to appease holiday travelers who were stranded in the airline’s latest fiasco with frequent flier miles and a mediocre, excuse-laden apology — but its pilots’ union (Southwest Airlines Pilots Association, SWAPA) is having none of it. They’ve called leadership out — referring to executive management as a cult in a letter that lists the ways their failures have led to the brand’s persistent problems. Instead of investing in much-needed technological upgrades and staffing, the letter accuses the airline of “maximizing shareholder return” at their expense. Like all corporate entities, Southwest has a duty to its employees and customers first. The airline’s massive disruptions will likely continue until it recognizes the need for corporate responsibility and purpose beyond enriching shareholders and stock buybacks.

Extreme winter weather caused a wave of cancellations across airlines this holiday season — although none weathered it quite as badly as Southwest. Over 15,000 flights were scratched by the transportation giant from December 22nd through the 30th. But it wasn’t just the ice and snow that did them in. As NPR and other news outlets reported, the raging “tripledemic” had many workers out sick — then to top it off Southwest’s ancient staff scheduling software just couldn’t handle the crisis.

What’s worse, though, is that none of this is a surprise to anyone at the airline. Union pilots have been begging leadership to upgrade their technology for years. “I fear that we are one thunderstorm, one ATC event, one router brownout from a complete meltdown. Whether that’s Thanksgiving, or Christmas, or New Year, that’s the precarious situation we are in,” Casey Murray, SWAPA President, is quoted as saying in November, not long before the meltdown.

In fact, this isn’t Southwest’s first self-inflicted disaster. An issue with air traffic control in Jacksonville was felt around the country in October 2021 when the incident had 29 percent of the airline’s flights canceled or temporarily grounded in cities nationwide. Additionally, 2,300 flights were canceled in July 2016 when the airline’s routers went out and issues in 2014 caused 130 flights to be canceled out of Chicago during the month of January. “Systemwide meltdowns at Southwest Airlines have been increasing in frequency and magnitude over the past 15 years,” according to the letter — which was signed by SWAPA’s 2nd Vice President Captain Tom Nekouei.

Nekouei’s main point throughout the letter is that a cultural shift happened at Southwest when Garry Kelly assumed the top position, noting that during that time the company rewarded shareholders with roughly $12 billion and Kelly’s compensation package went up 700 percent. Although he is no longer CEO, Nekouei asserts that Kelly’s influence still dominates the airline’s corporate culture.

Of the lack of investment in technological upgrades needed to keep flights running, Nekouei wrote: “Share buybacks that were once illegal, that provide no benefit for the Company itself while artificially inflating share prices (thus inflating stock-based executive compensation) and sent the clear message that the Company has excess cash on hand but that the CEO thinks there is no better place for investment of capital within his Company.”

Nekouei further noted that while nothing tangible has been done to fix the structural and technological problems, “we continue to receive saccharine corporate-communications- department-written and legal-counsel reviewed ‘we’re sorry’ and ‘I love you’ meaningless and generic messages from SWA corporate executives.” And, while these apologies ring hollow right along with the measly 25,000 frequent flier points Southwest has offered those travelers who were caught in the worst of the mess, Nekouei offered a solution — a return to the values and purpose the airline was founded on:

“You put your employees first. If you truly treat your employees that way, they will treat your customers well, your customers will come back, and that’s what makes your shareholders happy. So there’s no constituency at war with any other constituency. Ultimately, it’s shareholder value that you’re producing.” — Herb Kelleher

To see the original post, follow this link: https://www.triplepundit.com/story/2023/apologies-southwest-purpose/763871

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Tags: accountability, corporate social reponsibility, CSR, marketing, responsible brands, sustainable branding, sustainable brands
Categories : sustainable brands

Asia: Marketing Must Be Radically Reimagined To Achieve 2030 Sustainable Development Goals

17 01 2023

Dentsu and Kantar’s Sustainable Transformation Practice launch flagship study into the role APAC marketers play in achieving corporate sustainability ambitions.  

SUBMITTED BY DENTSU INTERNATIONAL• Reposted January 17, 2023

Graph depicting how Marketing and Insights departments lag behind other business divisions when it comes to executing and measuring progress on their sustainability objectives — DENTSU AND KANTAR’S SPECIAL REPORT ON CORPORATE SUSTAINABILITY HAS REVEALED THAT MARKETING AND INSIGHTS DEPARTMENTS LAG BEHIND OTHER BUSINESS DIVISIONS WHEN IT COMES TO EXECUTING AND MEASURING PROGRESS ON THEIR SUSTAINABILITY OBJECTIVES.

Marketing a Better Future is Asia-Pacific’s first study into marketers’ role in sustainability. 
The newly identified organisational intention-action gap is as big a challenge as the consumer intention-action gap to achieve 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs.)
Radically reimagining the role of marketing to make sustainable transformation its organising principle could help achieve 40-70% reductions in greenhouse gasses.

SINGAPORE, January 11, 2023 /CSRwire/ -Dentsu and Kantar today launch Marketing a Better Future, a flagship study exploring the role APAC marketers play in achieving corporate sustainability ambitions and SDGs.  

With the exponential growth of Asian economies, spending power is moving East with the region shaping global consumption trends. This gives Asian consumers and companies a new and unique responsibility, especially as the region is expected to bear the brunt of climate-related catastrophes. Consumer behaviour urgently needs to shift to more sustainable habits and lifestyles. According to Kantar’s latest Global Issues Barometer, climate issues are a key concern with nearly 60% of consumers globally saying they experience eco-anxiety which is driving increased consciousness and desire for action. In tandem, system-level changes are needed to reach global sustainability targets and ensure the planet’s future. There is no doubt that businesses, brands and their agency partners are at a nexus of need and opportunity. As the bridge between brands and consumers, marketers have a unique opportunity, and therefore the responsibility, to be generational agents of change influencing consumer behaviour, as well as driving customer-informed innovation.

Marketers are failing, however, to grasp the opportunity. Dentsu and Kantar’s inaugural study of over 70 brand marketers in 12 markets across Asia-Pacific found that only one in three (34%) marketing and insights teams are ‘executing against their sustainability plans and measuring progress’. This compares unfavourably to 46% in supply chain, and 51% in corporate strategy. The new study identified two significant intention-action gaps, the consumer intention-action gap and the organisational intention-action gap, where marketers’ challenges are rooted.

In order to achieve deep, needle-moving advancement in sustainability, the study found marketing functions need a philosophical revamp: to be given a mandate to drive innovation beyond short-term sales KPIs, to create growth that is good for society and the planet as well as business. Corporate sustainability transformation and sustainable consumption need to become the organising principle around which marketing functions. The study predicts that by making this radical change, brands will be able to drive the behaviour and lifestyle shifts required to achieve the 40% – 70% reductions in greenhouse gas emissions that the sixth IPCC assessment report estimates as achievable.

Dominic Powers, Chief Growth Officer, dentsu Asia Pacific, said, “Meaningful progress in sustainability requires an ecosystem level effort where businesses, consumers and civic society, policy makers, regulators and capital providers work in harmony. Marketers must not only be empowered by businesses to drive innovation that can fuel deep change, but they must also revamp the entire philosophy behind the way the function is designed, which is predicated on selling more. At dentsu we design the ‘what’s next’ for brands. It is clear that sustainable consumption has to be the organising principle of marketing teams, who must now instead focus on inspiring people everywhere to a new way of sustainable living. To do this, brands and marketers must reframe their constituents to include ecosystem partners that co-own the sector’s value chain and its carbon footprint. By positioning themselves as the change agent between the larger ecosystem, customers and their company, marketing teams will be uniquely positioned to drive relevant, resonant, step-change innovation that will help ensure a sustainable future for us all.”  

Trezelene Chan, Head, Sustainability Practice, Kantar APAC added, “We already know that the consumer intention-action gap is a problem for marketers, with 56% identifying it as a major challenge. Only 17% of Asian consumers actively change their behaviour to be more sustainable, despite 98% of Asians saying they will. Our study reveals, however, that the organizational intention-action gap is an equally important challenge to be addressed. Although 73% of marketers believe sustainability is important for business continuity and value growth, the study uncovered tactical and fundamental barriers that hinder marketers from taking on meaningful sustainable leadership. These include focus on short-term sales growth targets above all other KPIs, lack of clarity within the marketing function around metrics of success in relation to sustainability goals, and lack of adequate resources or capability building for sustainability within the marketing function. Innovation, collaboration and ownership across the different business functions against a clear set of sustainability goals will be required. Sustainability initiatives by the brand need to address consumers’ and the planet’s needs holistically and simultaneously. This means a whole new mindset for marketers and their corporate leaders.”  

Download the report here.

To see the original posts, follow this link: https://www.csrwire.com/press_releases/764006-marketing-must-be-radically-reimagined-achieve-2030-sustainable-development

For more information, contact:

Anna Lake, Marketing & Communications Director Asia Pacific, anna.lake@dentsu.com

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Tags: ESG, responsible brands, sustainable branding, sustainable brands
Categories : sustainable brands

Is Inflation Eating Into Consumers’ Support Of Purpose-Driven Companies?

16 01 2023

By Anne Field from Forbes.com • Reposted January 16, 2023

Ten years after it was launched, an annual index measuring U.S. consumers’ socially responsible attitudes and behaviors shows mixed progress.

GMG_2022_CCSi2 — The Conscious Consumer Spending index resultsGOOD.MUST.GROW

On the one hand, after coming in at a record low of 39 in 2020, the index rose to an all-time high of 51 the next year. In 2022, there was a slight decrease to 48.

On the other, the 2022 result was the second highest since the survey began.

That’s according to the Conscious Consumer Spending Index (CCSIndex), which gauges the extent to which consumers are—or aren’t—embracing conscious consumerism, charitable giving and environmentally-oriented practices.

“After those results in 2021, we expected to see at least a slight decline this year,” says Heath Shackleford, CEO of Good.Must.Grow, a socially responsible marketing consulting firm that administers the research. “But the vast majority of consumers continue to feel purpose is important when they shop.”

The CCSIndex is calculated by assessing such matters as the importance consumers place on buying from socially responsible companies, how they’re supporting those products and services and intent to increase their patronage of such companies. For this year’s research, 1,005 Americans were surveyed. According to Good.Must.Grow, thanks to the design of the index’s design, even a one-point change indicates a meaningful shift in consumer sentiment.

Higher Prices

Shackleford points to inflation as the main culprit for this year’s decrease. That’s because socially responsible products tend to be more expensive—or at least, are perceived as carrying a higher price tag—than their non-responsible counterparts, he says. Only 57% reported buying goods from socially responsible brands in 2022 compared to 64% in 2021. In 2013, the year of the inaugural index, it was 62%.

Young girl exploring organic body care goods at an open-air market with zero waste concept — *Teenager shopping at a summer market. Photo:* GETTY

The research shows that, says Shackleford, “A hard core of Americans will support purposeful brands no matter what.” But most of the country, even if they believe such purchases are important, feel they can’t afford to buy them during a time when their purchasing power is down.

At the same time, “A vast majority of consumers feels purpose is important when they shop,” he says. In addition, in 2013, 25% reported boycotting brands that weren’t socially responsible compared to 32% in 2022.

The lesson for companies is: They have to meet consumer expectations for factors like price, in addition to their mission, according to Shackleford.

Other Findings

Additional noteworthy results include:

A growing pessimism among Americans. Respondents indicated a growing sense that the world is getting worse. In 2019, 36% agreed with that statement, increasing to 42% in 2020 and 44% in 2021. In 2022, it was 45%. Also, while those who say the world is getting worse have a lower index score than people who say it’s getting better, the lowest score was for respondents who feel things are pretty much the same.

Decline in charitable giving. The portion of people who made financial contributions to a nonprofits declined by 20% from 2013 to 2022. Those volunteering also decreased.

Votes for the most socially responsible enterprise. For the eighth year, the poll asked respondents for the company or organization they first think of when they think of socially responsible enterprises. The top five: Amazon, Google, the Salvation Army, Apple and Walmart. Amazon, which has topped the list for four years in a row, received twice as many votes as Google in 2022. For the first time, TOMS, an iconic social enterprise, fell off the list. It was the top brand for the first two years of the poll.

To see the original post, follow this link. https://www.forbes.com/sites/annefield/2022/12/18/is-inflation-eating-into-consumers-support-of-purpose-driven-companies/?sh=1d67225a7c7c

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Tags: conscious consumer, corporate social reponsibility, ESG, Inflation impact, responsible brands, sustainable branding, sustainable brands
Categories : sustainable brands

How Artificial Intelligence Can Improve Companies’ ESG Work During 2023

16 01 2023

By Leon Kaye from Triple Pundit • Reposted: January 16, 2023

The growth of artificial intelligence (AI) has attracted its fair share of criticism in recent years just as it has become central to the conversation about how to scale up and improve ESG performance across corporate America.

To be fair, such concerns about AI are warranted. After all, humans are still designing these systems, so bias is still a risk at many levels, whether it comes to face recognition technology or how companies vet potential hires. Some brands, in fact, have pledged to work together to prevent algorithmic bias from entering the workplace. Google is an example of a company that says it is striving to teach developers about fairness considerations when building, evaluating and deploying AI and machine learning models.

Nevertheless, AI systems in aggregate can offer the ESG practitioner one important tool that will be hard to overlook: The ability to deal with the overwhelming amount of data through which teams must sift as they gauge their companies’ performance.

Some ways in which AI can prove to be useful, and score that “ah-ha” moment among the skeptics is when it comes to the “E” in ESG — as in measuring and finessing environmental performance. As the World Economic Forum (WEF) reminded us last week, one of the most difficult sets of data to measure are Scope 3 emissions, notoriously pesky to track as they comprise companies’ emissions coming from their supply and value chains. Chasing suppliers down for that data — if they’ll even measure and then reveal such information in the first place — is a task no sane person would demand from another. But reporting systems that run on AI can help solve that problem; WEF points to a BCG study concluding that companies harnessing such technologies are about twice as likely to both measure their emissions effectively and reach their emission reduction targets.

Further, while poorly designed AI systems are at risk of amplifying humans’ biases, at the same time on the “S” for social front, they can help to identify top candidates for jobs while identifying teams of current employees who are at risk of being disengaged. Optimized AI platforms can potentially smooth out potential rough patches between managers and their direct reports. “Managers’ biases can also creep in when it comes to setting goals for employees. AI can help by comparing employees’ goals against others with the same tenure and then alerting managers if they’re consistently assigning fewer or less important goals to certain workers,” wrote technology journalist Linda Rosencrance last year.

Outside a company’s office, AI and machine learning platforms can team up to identify possible snags within a supply chain — a lesson many organizations are still learning after what occurred worldwide during the global pandemic. Supply chain managers can deploy these technologies to help monitor human rights violations such as forced labor or risks including unsafe working conditions.

As for companies with a very specific mission, AI is achieving what used to take huge teams of professionals to accomplish. Take the plant-based protein industry, which on one hand can harness this technology to determine what raw materials can recreate the texture and nutrition of meat at a competitive cost — while on the other AI-driven sequencing can even improve their flavors, too.

Finally, at a time when more investors adopt an ESG framework to hone in on companies’ governance structures, AI can also lend an assist. Companies with operations spread all over the globe need to know in real time how regulations differ in different companies and here in the U.S., even in different states. Next-generation risk modeling can help corporate boards make decisions with the best possible information as they evaluate market trends and potential risks. “As for governance, a focus on data sovereignty and the creation of a single view of real-time data ensures that data is treated with respect,” Mike Hughes wrote for Forbes last month.

To see the original post, follow this link. https://www.triplepundit.com/story/2023/artificial-intelligence-esg-2023/763941

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Tags: artificial intelligence ESG, corporate social responsibility, CSR, ESG, responsible brands, sustainable branding
Categories : sustainable brands

4 tips from a CSR expert on how to make the most impact in 2023

16 01 2023

Effective ESG practices provide companies with an opportunity to demonstrate their commitment to environmental sustainability, community and equity by integrating these tenets into everyday business processes and company culture.

By Jess Welser – Director of B:CIVIC and CSR, Denver Metro Chamber Leadership Foundation • Reposted: January 16, 2023

As I look back on the stories shared in this year’s Good Works Colorado content hub, I’m thrilled to see how our state’s leaders have enthusiastically implemented environmental, social and governance policies (ESG) and invested in corporate social responsibility (CSR) efforts.

ESG and CSR are constantly evolving. ESG is a framework for measuring and managing risks and opportunities around a company’s commitment to environmental, social and corporate governance. CSR is a reflection of what a company believes, expressed by how it impacts its stakeholders internally and externally. We like to think of it as how a company aligns its social and environmental activities with its business purpose and values. Or elevating business for good. More and more, ESG and CSR are recognized as an essential component of a smart, viable business strategy for Colorado companies.

This was one of our founding goals at B:CIVIC, an affiliate of the Denver Metro Chamber Leadership Foundation. Alongside business and community leaders, B:CIVIC is increasing the amount of impact and collective good for the Colorado community. After eight years of doing this work, there are a few lessons we want to share with business leaders who are on their ESG and CSR journey.

1. Now’s the time for ESG.

As our community faces unprecedented social, economic and environmental challenges, local corporations are taking ownership of their impact through ESG. Effective ESG practices provide companies with an opportunity to demonstrate their commitment to environmental sustainability, community and equity by integrating these tenets into everyday business processes and company culture.

As ESG practices advance in Colorado and across the globe, it’s important that business leaders continue to develop and enhance their ESG strategy. Like the ever-changing world around us, these strategies must remain nimble to meet the moment — whatever that moment has in store.

2. It pays to invest in CSR.

As we head into what may be a recession, many companies are preparing for economic downturn by downsizing budgets, instituting travel freezes and more. Though the immediate future remains uncertain, we know CSR programs and personnel are an important investment for a company’s long-term success.

To ensure continued engagement, we are encouraging CSR leaders to double down. The economic downturn will impact industries differently, but we can anticipate that employee giving and engagement will experience a decline. Further, economic hardship causes increased stress among employees. To encourage connection, focus on promoting skills-based volunteering and employee well-being programs that boost morale and build community. As we continue through these uncertain times, we challenge CSR leaders to get creative with their CSR strategies. It pays to invest in the community and your people, especially in times of economic hardship.

3. Colorado is a good place to do business.

Did you know Colorado is one of the best places to do business? In a 2022 CNBC ranking, Colorado came in at No. 4 in America’s Top States for Business list. The state also ranked No. 12 in the category of life, health and inclusion. These rankings are in large part due to the social impact commitments of our business community — commitments that are continuing to grow alongside our economy.

The secret’s out: People, organizations and businesses are making the move to Colorado to join in on the great benefits this state has to offer. As the business community grows, the resources available for CSR and ESG will grow with it. The future is full of possibilities for CSR and ESG impact.

4. Create the infrastructure today to meet the challenges of tomorrow.

When business leaders invest in a company’s CSR infrastructure today, they are better prepared to speak out and advocate for the issues that matter to their community and stakeholders. In a recent report released by the Edelman Trust Barometer — a metric that studies trust in business, government, NGOs and the media — it was found that employees care about how their leadership demonstrates commitment to the community.

According to the Trust Barometer, when considering a job, 60% of employees stated that they want their CEO to speak out on controversial issues they care about. Eighty percent of the general population want CEOs to be personally visible when discussing public policy with external stakeholders or work their company has done to benefit society. Further, 60% of people surveyed will choose a place to work based on their beliefs and values.

It’s clear the workforce wants business leaders to stand up for the issues that matter to them. Implementing ESG and CSR practices is a great way to demonstrate your company’s commitment to the community.

As your team is planning for next year, we hope that you consider the above guidance to maximize the impact of your CSR and ESG practices. Want to keep the conversation going? Reach out to our team at B:CIVIC. Together, we can increase the impact and collective good of the community.

To see the original post of this article, follow this link. https://www.bizjournals.com/denver/news/2022/12/23/4-tips-from-csr-expert-on-how-to-make-an-impact.html

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Tags: corporate social reponsibility, corporate social responsibility, CSR, responsible brands, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands
Categories : sustainable brands

Newsweek publishes its list of America’s Most Responsible Companies for 2023

15 01 2023

America’s Most Responsible Companies 2023

In recent years, and especially with the rise in popularity of “ESG” (environment, social and corporate governance) focused investing, “corporate responsibility” has become a phrase many companies are happy to use in their advertising. There is no set definition but generally it is used as shorthand for “Our company is not a soulless machine designed to do absolutely anything–no matter how destructive, reckless or dishonest–in pursuit of a buck.” In any given case, it can be hard to tell whether such a statement means a corporation really tries to treat its customers, employees and planet decently or is just public relations blather. Talking the talk is easy, but walking the walk is hard.

To highlight those corporations that are actually serious about trying to be good guys, Newsweek has partnered with global research and data firm Statista for our fourth annual list of America’s Most Responsible Companies. This year our list includes 500 of the U.S’s largest public corporations. They vary dramatically by size and by industry. We found the largest number of responsible companies (55) in the materials and chemicals business; the fewest (12) in hotels, dining and leisure. Our overall number one this year is the computer hardware giant HP.

We are proud to present this year’s ranking and to honor companies that actually mean it when they say they are serious about being good corporate citizens.

Rank	Company	HQ State	Industry Rank	Industry	Overall Score	Environmental Score	Social Score	Corporate Governance Score
1	HP	California	1	Technology Hardware	93.09	94.94	99.51	84.93
2	General Mills	Minnesota	1	Consumer Goods	91.79	92.06	86.84	96.56
3	Whirlpool Corporation	Michigan	2	Consumer Goods	91.53	93.83	85.21	95.64
4	Merck & Co	New Jersey	1	Health Care & Life Sciences	89.95	91.07	100.00	78.86
5	Clorox	California	3	Consumer Goods	89.56	94.68	88.08	86.03
6	HNI	Iowa	4	Consumer Goods	89.40	96.21	87.92	84.15
7	Applied Materials	California	2	Technology Hardware	89.12	91.02	89.64	86.80
8	Intel	California	3	Technology Hardware	88.98	88.30	92.51	86.21
9	S&P Global	New York	1	Financial	88.80	95.23	71.27	100.00
10	Tapestry	New York	5	Consumer Goods	88.69	91.60	87.42	87.14
11	Xylem	District of Columbia	1	Capital Goods	88.68	95.02	77.21	93.90
12	Abbott Laboratories	Illinois	2	Health Care & Life Sciences	88.03	89.84	80.92	93.40
13	Qualcomm	California	4	Technology Hardware	87.72	83.35	83.79	96.10
14	Keysight Technologies	California	1	Software & Telecommunications	87.68	89.86	79.21	94.08
15	Aptargroup	Illinois	1	Materials & Chemicals	87.68	96.78	88.24	78.13
16	Texas Instruments	Texas	5	Technology Hardware	87.39	84.57	95.15	82.53
17	Microsoft	Washington	2	Software & Telecommunications	86.97	98.76	69.11	93.14
18	Estee Lauder Companies	New York	6	Consumer Goods	86.61	92.85	81.38	85.69
19	Cisco Systems	California	6	Technology Hardware	86.55	99.51	74.55	85.70
20	Advanced Micro Devices	California	7	Technology Hardware	86.52	93.97	75.37	90.30
21	Broadcom	California	8	Technology Hardware	86.29	81.92	82.42	94.61
22	Avient	Ohio	2	Materials & Chemicals	86.27	91.09	78.53	89.28
23	Sensata Technologies	Massachusetts	9	Technology Hardware	86.03	86.78	78.17	93.23
24	Owens Corning	Ohio	3	Materials & Chemicals	85.80	82.41	79.89	95.19
25	Corteva	Indiana	4	Materials & Chemicals	85.79	81.40	80.38	95.69
26	NVIDIA	California	10	Technology Hardware	85.69	86.94	84.08	86.13
27	Illumina	California	3	Health Care & Life Sciences	85.54	90.58	93.37	72.75
28	Campbell Soup	New Jersey	7	Consumer Goods	85.25	91.90	78.60	85.34
29	Boston Properties	Massachusetts	1	Real Estate & Housing	85.23	99.38	78.13	78.29
30	Analog Devices	Massachusetts	11	Technology Hardware	85.09	95.59	72.45	87.34
31	Lumentum	California	3	Software & Telecommunications	85.03	93.08	76.47	85.63
32	Jacobs	Texas	1	Professional Services	84.98	95.21	79.32	80.50
33	Maxim Integrated Products	California	12	Technology Hardware	84.95	91.57	80.18	83.20
34	Hewlett Packard Enterprise	Texas	13	Technology Hardware	84.80	95.30	83.15	76.04
35	Cummins	Indiana	1	Automotive & Components	84.63	92.14	78.16	83.68
36	Lear Corporation	Michigan	2	Automotive & Components	84.62	91.81	70.80	91.34
37	Edgewell Personal Care	Connecticut	8	Consumer Goods	84.57	89.89	77.34	86.57
38	PayPal Holdings	California	2	Financial	84.35	93.75	69.97	89.42
39	Walt Disney	California	1	Hotels, Dining & Leisure	84.27	93.57	76.40	82.94
40	Mastercard	New York	3	Financial	84.20	96.27	65.90	90.52
41	Comerica	Texas	4	Financial	84.09	90.75	83.01	78.59
42	Trinseo	Pennsylvania	5	Materials & Chemicals	84.04	91.99	77.87	82.34
43	United Rentals	Connecticut	2	Professional Services	83.74	92.09	81.64	77.60
44	Iron Mountain	Massachusetts	4	Software & Telecommunications	83.72	93.35	72.52	85.39
45	Regeneron Pharmaceuticals	New York	4	Health Care & Life Sciences	83.56	85.08	87.69	77.98
46	Ecolab	Minnesota	6	Materials & Chemicals	83.55	96.38	84.50	69.88
47	Berry Global	Indiana	7	Materials & Chemicals	83.51	90.29	74.12	86.20
48	Sun Communities	Michigan	2	Real Estate & Housing	83.48	90.36	74.08	86.09
49	Newmont Gold	Colorado	8	Materials & Chemicals	83.40	66.21	94.67	89.39
50	Eversource Energy	Massachusetts	1	Energy & Utilities	83.30	94.15	82.19	73.66
51	Vertex Pharmaceuticals	Massachusetts	5	Health Care & Life Sciences	83.26	74.61	91.84	83.40
52	Seagen	Washington	6	Health Care & Life Sciences	83.18	84.07	83.06	82.48
53	American Tower	Massachusetts	5	Software & Telecommunications	83.12	87.15	81.74	80.56
54	Lam Research	California	14	Technology Hardware	82.99	92.98	87.88	68.22
55	Granite Construction	California	2	Capital Goods	82.98	83.97	77.91	87.15
56	General Motors	Michigan	3	Automotive & Components	82.94	91.34	68.28	89.29
57	Crane	Connecticut	9	Materials & Chemicals	82.79	84.81	77.92	85.72
58	Ingevity	South Carolina	10	Materials & Chemicals	82.63	72.51	88.21	87.23
59	Zoetis	New Jersey	7	Health Care & Life Sciences	82.60	85.41	77.75	84.72
60	Baxter International	Illinois	8	Health Care & Life Sciences	82.59	92.17	80.80	74.90
61	Moody’s	New York	5	Financial	82.54	84.44	71.16	92.10
62	Edwards Lifesciences	California	9	Health Care & Life Sciences	82.49	86.87	71.63	89.05
63	Lowe’s Companies	North Carolina	1	Retail	82.40	91.27	75.88	80.12
64	Public Service Enterprise Group	New Jersey	2	Energy & Utilities	82.33	80.83	81.89	84.35
65	Kimberly-Clark	Texas	9	Consumer Goods	82.30	79.51	76.14	91.33
66	Jabil	Florida	15	Technology Hardware	82.11	83.52	73.91	88.96
67	Regency Centers	Florida	3	Real Estate & Housing	82.02	88.76	77.32	80.09
68	Motorola Solutions	Illinois	16	Technology Hardware	81.99	90.44	71.88	83.74
69	Keurig Dr Pepper	Massachusetts	10	Consumer Goods	81.98	88.08	74.86	83.09
70	Dell Technologies	Texas	17	Technology Hardware	81.93	92.28	76.13	77.47
71	AGCO	Georgia	3	Capital Goods	81.92	75.62	81.99	88.23
72	Las Vegas Sands	Nevada	2	Hotels, Dining & Leisure	81.76	87.37	80.52	77.47
73	Waste Management	Texas	3	Energy & Utilities	81.63	82.36	84.30	78.31
74	Jones Lang LaSalle	Illinois	4	Real Estate & Housing	81.63	84.26	72.31	88.39
75	Western Digital	California	18	Technology Hardware	81.58	83.56	83.18	78.08
76	Armstrong World Industries	Pennsylvania	4	Capital Goods	81.48	84.02	78.07	82.42
77	Ribbon	Texas	6	Software & Telecommunications	81.39	82.50	77.31	84.44
78	Kroger	Ohio	2	Retail	81.34	88.15	71.76	84.19
79	Principal Financial Group	Iowa	6	Financial	81.21	83.48	73.94	86.29
80	Caleres	Missouri	11	Consumer Goods	81.14	81.32	81.98	80.19
81	McCormick & Company	Maryland	12	Consumer Goods	81.06	93.59	83.26	66.42
82	Summit Materials	Colorado	11	Materials & Chemicals	80.98	83.89	72.87	86.26
83	Kimball International	Indiana	13	Consumer Goods	80.89	89.72	79.05	74.01
84	Adobe	California	7	Software & Telecommunications	80.87	88.81	71.99	81.89
85	Amphenol	Connecticut	19	Technology Hardware	80.84	89.67	73.70	79.25
86	Huntington Bancshares	Ohio	7	Financial	80.82	84.50	79.26	78.80
87	Cadence Design Systems	California	8	Software & Telecommunications	80.79	63.79	89.22	89.41
88	PPL	Pennsylvania	4	Energy & Utilities	80.78	68.57	99.28	74.55
89	Ball Corp	Colorado	12	Materials & Chemicals	80.69	86.84	79.95	75.38
90	EXL Services	New York	3	Professional Services	80.67	77.72	72.03	92.33
91	Healthpeak Properties	Colorado	5	Real Estate & Housing	80.54	90.28	74.84	76.59
92	Sherwin-Williams	Ohio	13	Materials & Chemicals	80.49	87.99	70.06	83.50
93	Univar Solutions	Illinois	14	Materials & Chemicals	80.47	92.82	62.65	86.02
94	American Water	New Jersey	5	Energy & Utilities	80.43	74.22	91.94	75.22
95	Hasbro	Rhode Island	14	Consumer Goods	80.41	89.37	85.22	66.72
96	Apple	California	20	Technology Hardware	80.24	91.37	63.00	86.45
97	Target	Minnesota	3	Retail	80.18	90.21	70.30	80.10
98	Newell Brands	Georgia	15	Consumer Goods	80.00	81.88	72.44	85.75
99	Deere	Illinois	5	Capital Goods	80.00	87.93	87.43	64.71
100	ManpowerGroup	Wisconsin	4	Professional Services	79.93	93.09	72.27	74.53
101	Agilent Technologies	California	10	Health Care & Life Sciences	79.93	94.52	64.92	80.45
102	Baker Hughes	Texas	6	Energy & Utilities	79.89	91.90	77.34	70.53
103	American Express	New York	8	Financial	79.87	93.46	64.71	81.55
104	PNC Financial Services	Pennsylvania	9	Financial	79.81	83.32	78.98	77.22
105	Hudson Pacific Properties	California	6	Real Estate & Housing	79.70	84.21	75.65	79.33
106	First Solar	Arizona	7	Energy & Utilities	79.67	89.78	73.58	75.74
107	Eastman Chemical	Tennessee	15	Materials & Chemicals	79.66	68.34	86.24	84.48
108	Mettler-Toledo International	Ohio	21	Technology Hardware	79.61	88.19	64.81	85.91
109	Nielsen	New York	5	Professional Services	79.59	83.71	74.16	80.98
110	Hess	New York	8	Energy & Utilities	79.59	77.88	81.73	79.24
111	Colgate-Palmolive	New York	16	Consumer Goods	79.55	80.54	74.87	83.31
112	CenterPoint Energy	Texas	9	Energy & Utilities	79.54	71.01	92.37	75.31
113	CBRE Group	Texas	7	Real Estate & Housing	79.52	72.99	77.71	87.94
114	PPG Industries	Pennsylvania	16	Materials & Chemicals	79.47	82.40	77.58	78.53
115	Becton Dickinson and	New Jersey	11	Health Care & Life Sciences	79.46	88.51	68.86	81.09
116	Carter’s	Georgia	17	Consumer Goods	79.41	88.69	74.67	74.98
117	Verizon Communications	New York	9	Software & Telecommunications	79.39	88.20	73.27	76.79
118	Ubiquiti	New York	10	Software & Telecommunications	79.16	83.55	64.83	89.18
119	BorgWarner	Michigan	4	Automotive & Components	79.07	79.11	78.49	79.67
120	PotlatchDeltic	Washington	6	Capital Goods	79.05	78.84	72.51	85.88
121	M&T Bank	New York	10	Financial	79.01	83.65	70.18	83.28
122	W W Grainger	Illinois	7	Capital Goods	78.95	76.67	75.74	84.51
123	Autodesk	California	11	Software & Telecommunications	78.94	84.13	84.96	67.82
124	IBM	New York	12	Software & Telecommunications	78.87	80.96	76.78	78.93
125	Howmet Aerospace	Pennsylvania	8	Capital Goods	78.85	80.63	69.02	86.99
126	Deckers Outdoor	California	18	Consumer Goods	78.83	69.73	82.82	84.02
127	California Water Service Group	California	10	Energy & Utilities	78.77	70.14	89.84	76.40
128	Regal Rexnord	Wisconsin	9	Capital Goods	78.67	93.11	67.73	75.26
129	Nasdaq	New York	11	Financial	78.67	76.01	63.99	96.08
130	Micron Technology	Idaho	22	Technology Hardware	78.64	80.36	78.30	77.34
131	Zurn Elkay Water Solutions	Wisconsin	10	Capital Goods	78.56	80.96	76.58	78.22
132	Thermo Fisher Scientific	Massachusetts	12	Health Care & Life Sciences	78.54	77.03	72.55	86.11
133	CommScope Holding Company	North Carolina	23	Technology Hardware	78.47	94.42	67.54	73.55
134	Kraft Heinz	Illinois	19	Consumer Goods	78.45	81.08	70.64	83.71
135	FMC	Pennsylvania	17	Materials & Chemicals	78.38	85.01	67.12	83.09
136	Tennant Company	Minnesota	11	Capital Goods	78.37	67.74	87.11	80.34
137	CSX	Florida	1	Transport & Logistics	78.26	84.64	69.58	80.65
138	Celanese	Texas	18	Materials & Chemicals	78.26	69.34	97.35	68.16
139	AZZ	Texas	12	Capital Goods	78.20	83.27	65.97	85.43
140	IDEXX Laboratories	Maine	13	Health Care & Life Sciences	78.19	75.78	82.62	76.26
141	Gap	California	4	Retail	78.19	77.43	67.99	89.22
142	Williams Companies	Oklahoma	11	Energy & Utilities	78.17	66.14	92.03	76.41
143	Emerson Electric	Missouri	13	Capital Goods	78.13	85.11	72.76	76.61
144	Church & Dwight	New Jersey	20	Consumer Goods	78.07	93.44	72.03	68.82
145	Marriott International	Maryland	3	Hotels, Dining & Leisure	78.06	79.55	81.82	72.88
146	Sempra	California	12	Energy & Utilities	78.05	65.63	88.56	80.02
147	Invesco	Georgia	12	Financial	78.03	91.13	65.32	77.73
148	Valvoline	Kentucky	5	Automotive & Components	77.92	78.89	72.41	82.54
149	Ingersoll Rand	North Carolina	14	Capital Goods	77.88	81.96	66.93	84.83
150	UnitedHealth Group	Minnesota	14	Health Care & Life Sciences	77.88	91.86	71.44	70.43
151	Viasat	California	13	Software & Telecommunications	77.84	87.03	73.77	72.83
152	The Home Depot	Georgia	5	Retail	77.80	78.62	76.63	78.25
153	Host Hotels & Resorts	Maryland	4	Hotels, Dining & Leisure	77.78	90.06	68.78	74.60
154	Norfolk Southern	Georgia	2	Transport & Logistics	77.77	82.82	70.79	79.77
155	Repligen	Massachusetts	15	Health Care & Life Sciences	77.76	76.55	66.71	90.08
156	Visteon	Michigan	6	Automotive & Components	77.74	92.04	73.42	67.87
157	Yum! Brands	Kentucky	5	Hotels, Dining & Leisure	77.71	91.58	62.77	78.88
158	Lennox International	Texas	15	Capital Goods	77.71	89.84	74.66	68.70
159	ServiceNow	California	14	Software & Telecommunications	77.68	78.01	68.52	86.58
160	Commercial Metals Company	Texas	19	Materials & Chemicals	77.68	82.80	70.45	79.86
161	Conagra Brands	Illinois	21	Consumer Goods	77.63	90.13	69.81	73.03
162	Waters	Massachusetts	16	Health Care & Life Sciences	77.63	92.65	67.26	73.06
163	JPMorgan Chase & Co	New York	13	Financial	77.60	84.01	63.49	85.37
164	AbbVie	Illinois	17	Health Care & Life Sciences	77.55	84.39	70.83	77.52
165	MetLife	New York	14	Financial	77.48	81.34	67.32	83.87
166	West Pharmaceutical Services	Pennsylvania	18	Health Care & Life Sciences	77.44	79.24	69.22	83.95
167	California Resources	California	13	Energy & Utilities	77.28	73.02	83.69	75.20
168	Danaher	District of Columbia	19	Health Care & Life Sciences	77.22	69.86	77.65	84.23
169	FedEx	Tennessee	3	Transport & Logistics	77.21	73.68	75.95	82.08
170	Nordson	Ohio	16	Capital Goods	77.15	70.80	83.41	77.30
171	Bank of America	North Carolina	15	Financial	77.14	90.29	69.73	71.50
172	USANA Health Sciences	Utah	22	Consumer Goods	77.02	74.05	75.44	81.65
173	Labcorp	North Carolina	20	Health Care & Life Sciences	76.96	84.11	70.48	76.40
174	Teradata	California	15	Software & Telecommunications	76.95	78.68	61.31	90.94
175	Best Buy	Minnesota	6	Retail	76.88	92.52	72.76	65.45
176	Kennametal	Pennsylvania	17	Capital Goods	76.88	86.16	73.53	71.02
177	Stanley Black & Decker	Connecticut	18	Capital Goods	76.87	92.66	64.90	73.14
178	Alcoa	Pennsylvania	20	Materials & Chemicals	76.80	61.43	81.71	87.33
179	Koppers	Pennsylvania	20	Materials & Chemicals	76.80	79.18	80.90	70.41
180	United Therapeutics	Maryland	21	Health Care & Life Sciences	76.79	61.45	83.94	85.03
181	Pfizer	New York	22	Health Care & Life Sciences	76.76	73.35	69.78	87.21
182	Masco	Michigan	19	Capital Goods	76.69	75.36	69.09	85.71
183	Kimco Realty	New York	8	Real Estate & Housing	76.67	86.40	85.32	58.37
184	Qurate Retail Group	Pennsylvania	7	Retail	76.56	88.55	71.53	69.68
185	Otis	Connecticut	20	Capital Goods	76.50	75.28	72.03	82.26
186	Organon & Co.	New Jersey	23	Health Care & Life Sciences	76.43	76.62	84.31	68.44
187	Reliance Worldwide Corporation	Georgia	21	Capital Goods	76.38	67.26	75.24	86.71
188	Air Products and Chemicals	Pennsylvania	22	Materials & Chemicals	76.37	78.01	76.99	74.18
189	Fluor Corporation	Texas	22	Capital Goods	76.33	80.70	70.03	78.34
190	SPX	North Carolina	23	Capital Goods	76.31	78.14	71.93	78.94
191	Darling Ingredients	Texas	23	Consumer Goods	76.29	71.36	68.34	89.25
192	Insulet Corporation	Massachusetts	24	Health Care & Life Sciences	76.24	79.80	77.57	71.45
193	Essex Property Trust	California	9	Real Estate & Housing	76.16	88.54	71.38	68.65
194	Truist Financial	North Carolina	16	Financial	76.11	68.78	82.04	77.59
195	Atkore	Illinois	24	Capital Goods	76.11	75.26	67.06	86.09
196	Pioneer Natural Resources	Texas	14	Energy & Utilities	76.09	82.80	79.19	66.36
197	VMware	California	16	Software & Telecommunications	75.99	100.00	45.92	82.14
198	Regions Financial	Alabama	17	Financial	75.97	73.19	77.66	77.14
199	Workday	California	17	Software & Telecommunications	75.97	78.88	67.52	81.59
200	Snap	California	18	Software & Telecommunications	75.92	71.28	84.77	71.77
201	PVH	New York	8	Retail	75.90	88.60	66.97	72.21
202	Fifth Third Bank	Ohio	18	Financial	75.89	93.19	70.25	64.33
203	Infinera	California	24	Technology Hardware	75.89	81.94	68.99	76.82
204	Kilroy Realty	California	10	Real Estate & Housing	75.87	88.92	63.42	75.36
205	Watts Water Technologies	Massachusetts	25	Capital Goods	75.83	80.24	66.15	81.17
206	Xerox	Connecticut	25	Technology Hardware	75.80	96.38	62.48	68.63
207	Prudential	New Jersey	19	Financial	75.78	81.09	65.55	80.79
208	Digital Realty Trust	Texas	11	Real Estate & Housing	75.77	80.92	78.39	68.09
209	Onsemi	Arizona	26	Technology Hardware	75.68	85.99	56.07	85.06
210	BizLink	California	26	Technology Hardware	75.68	80.82	73.65	72.64
211	Brixmor Property Group	New York	12	Real Estate & Housing	75.65	73.27	87.61	66.15
212	APA Corp	Texas	15	Energy & Utilities	75.59	64.61	74.63	87.61
213	Tractor Supply Co.	Tennessee	9	Retail	75.50	80.36	77.17	69.07
214	Dover Corporation	Illinois	26	Capital Goods	75.47	73.53	68.81	84.14
215	Universal Display	New Jersey	28	Technology Hardware	75.44	74.99	80.47	70.93
216	United Parcel Service	Georgia	4	Transport & Logistics	75.43	75.20	74.26	76.91
217	Dana	Ohio	7	Automotive & Components	75.42	83.11	70.38	72.86
218	Microchip	Arizona	29	Technology Hardware	75.42	81.47	64.43	80.44
219	Teledyne Technologies	California	30	Technology Hardware	75.41	80.23	69.89	76.18
220	Element Solutions	Florida	23	Materials & Chemicals	75.40	86.74	66.46	73.09
221	GXO	Connecticut	5	Transport & Logistics	75.32	76.83	79.62	69.60
222	Fortune Brands	Illinois	24	Consumer Goods	75.29	80.46	71.95	73.53
223	Weatherford International	Texas	16	Energy & Utilities	75.25	70.35	78.98	76.48
224	Federal Realty Investment Trust	Maryland	13	Real Estate & Housing	75.21	86.32	64.41	74.97
225	J M Smucker	Ohio	25	Consumer Goods	75.20	86.35	63.52	75.81
226	GlobalFoundries	New York	31	Technology Hardware	75.16	88.69	66.35	70.52
227	AT&T	Texas	19	Software & Telecommunications	75.14	80.16	72.36	72.97
228	General Electric	Massachusetts	27	Capital Goods	75.10	77.63	70.37	77.37
229	Hubbell	Connecticut	28	Capital Goods	75.05	77.63	69.09	78.51
230	VF Corporation	Colorado	26	Consumer Goods	75.05	84.58	69.76	70.88
231	AvalonBay Communities	Virginia	14	Real Estate & Housing	74.83	92.14	67.11	65.32
232	Vornado Realty Trust	New York	15	Real Estate & Housing	74.79	90.43	62.69	71.34
233	Crown Holdings	Pennsylvania	24	Materials & Chemicals	74.77	74.30	63.92	86.16
234	Virtusa	Massachusetts	20	Software & Telecommunications	74.67	89.48	64.03	70.59
235	Cintas	Ohio	27	Consumer Goods	74.60	75.71	68.64	79.53
236	State Street	Massachusetts	20	Financial	74.59	88.58	53.64	81.63
237	Public Storage	California	16	Real Estate & Housing	74.51	86.47	70.01	67.14
238	Greif	Ohio	25	Materials & Chemicals	74.44	87.02	58.16	78.23
239	Pacific Premier Bancorp	California	21	Financial	74.37	83.93	69.64	69.63
240	Helmerich & Payne	Oklahoma	17	Energy & Utilities	74.36	67.68	73.13	82.34
241	Salesforce.Com	California	21	Software & Telecommunications	74.27	78.96	71.66	72.28
242	LPL Financial	California	22	Financial	74.26	81.86	69.45	71.54
243	Comfort Systems USA	Texas	29	Capital Goods	74.22	77.06	68.99	76.69
244	Realty Income	California	17	Real Estate & Housing	74.20	70.20	89.58	62.89
245	National Energy Services Reunited	Texas	18	Energy & Utilities	74.19	79.00	66.08	77.58
246	Albemarle	North Carolina	26	Materials & Chemicals	74.19	70.58	83.93	68.13
247	Crown Castle	Texas	22	Software & Telecommunications	74.15	71.89	72.70	77.93
248	Arista Networks	California	23	Software & Telecommunications	74.05	76.50	65.10	80.64
249	Quaker Houghton	Pennsylvania	27	Materials & Chemicals	74.03	75.34	60.05	86.78
250	ADM	Illinois	28	Consumer Goods	73.97	80.60	72.96	68.45
251	Bunge	Missouri	29	Consumer Goods	73.91	88.15	67.90	65.76
252	Unum	Tennessee	23	Financial	73.90	71.23	71.50	79.04
253	SBA	Florida	24	Software & Telecommunications	73.87	67.95	66.82	86.92
254	Hormel Foods	Minnesota	30	Consumer Goods	73.87	79.32	83.45	58.93
255	Ventas	Illinois	18	Real Estate & Housing	73.81	71.81	70.45	79.24
256	Spire	Missouri	19	Energy & Utilities	73.79	64.77	85.24	71.43
257	Timken	Ohio	30	Capital Goods	73.77	80.52	71.70	69.18
258	Bank of New York Mellon	New York	24	Financial	73.76	87.92	65.38	68.07
259	Omnicom Group	New York	6	Professional Services	73.74	71.89	71.33	78.07
260	Itron	Washington	7	Professional Services	73.73	80.40	68.43	72.44
261	Phibro Animal Health	New Jersey	25	Health Care & Life Sciences	73.72	71.06	69.62	80.55
262	Constellation Energy Corporation	Maryland	20	Energy & Utilities	73.70	64.29	85.66	71.20
263	Juniper Networks	California	32	Technology Hardware	73.67	67.29	74.16	79.62
264	Cirrus Logic	Texas	33	Technology Hardware	73.64	63.04	73.17	84.78
265	Adtalem Global Education	Illinois	8	Professional Services	73.63	77.22	71.77	71.99
266	Teradyne	Massachusetts	34	Technology Hardware	73.60	79.63	49.88	91.39
267	ABM Industries	New York	9	Professional Services	73.60	56.98	77.11	86.77
268	Coupa	California	25	Software & Telecommunications	73.56	73.90	65.71	81.15
269	Allison Transmission	Indiana	31	Capital Goods	73.51	80.66	64.32	75.63
270	Macerich	California	19	Real Estate & Housing	73.50	90.03	56.91	73.64
271	Illinois Tool Works	Illinois	32	Capital Goods	73.44	82.94	68.83	68.64
272	Kosmos Energy	Texas	21	Energy & Utilities	73.42	70.55	80.35	69.43
273	TPI Composites	Arizona	33	Capital Goods	73.42	73.53	82.35	64.43
274	Knowles Corporation	Illinois	35	Technology Hardware	73.40	87.24	68.29	64.75
275	TJX Companies	Massachusetts	10	Retail	73.37	73.77	66.66	79.75
276	Avanos Medical	Georgia	26	Health Care & Life Sciences	73.36	76.48	73.23	70.45
277	AMETEK	Pennsylvania	36	Technology Hardware	73.26	86.15	70.66	63.07
278	Tanger Factory Outlet Centers	North Carolina	20	Real Estate & Housing	73.25	83.35	74.98	61.52
279	Cooper-Standard Holdings	Michigan	8	Automotive & Components	73.11	90.46	72.41	56.55
280	NiSource	Indiana	22	Energy & Utilities	73.08	71.70	76.54	71.06
281	American Axle & Manufacturing Holdings	Michigan	9	Automotive & Components	73.04	78.04	65.52	75.64
282	Halliburton	Texas	23	Energy & Utilities	73.03	74.06	71.49	73.63
283	Helen of Troy	Texas	31	Consumer Goods	73.00	79.45	79.53	60.11
284	NetApp	California	26	Software & Telecommunications	72.96	67.82	60.00	91.13
285	ResMed	California	27	Health Care & Life Sciences	72.93	74.90	67.88	76.08
286	Alliant Energy	Wisconsin	24	Energy & Utilities	72.93	69.08	86.65	63.12
287	Hilton Worldwide Holdings	Virginia	6	Hotels, Dining & Leisure	72.92	75.42	67.57	75.85
288	Catalent	New Jersey	28	Health Care & Life Sciences	72.92	81.30	68.63	68.90
289	Westrock	Georgia	28	Materials & Chemicals	72.90	64.82	70.81	83.14
290	Carrier	Florida	34	Capital Goods	72.87	80.92	72.64	65.13
291	Expeditors International of Washington	Washington	6	Transport & Logistics	72.84	80.80	76.32	61.48
292	Gen	Arizona	27	Software & Telecommunications	72.80	61.31	67.41	89.73
293	Mueller Water Products	Georgia	35	Capital Goods	72.79	74.34	70.80	73.31
294	Caterpillar	Illinois	36	Capital Goods	72.72	76.58	62.06	79.62
295	Green Plains	Nebraska	29	Materials & Chemicals	72.71	61.18	75.07	81.94
296	XPO Logistics	Connecticut	7	Transport & Logistics	72.70	67.66	72.58	77.94
297	Equity Residential	Illinois	21	Real Estate & Housing	72.66	84.70	65.64	67.73
298	Aramark	Pennsylvania	7	Hotels, Dining & Leisure	72.62	74.99	68.87	74.06
299	Alphabet (Google)	California	28	Software & Telecommunications	72.53	88.93	59.50	69.25
300	Petco	California	11	Retail	72.50	84.16	59.57	73.83
301	Ormat Technologies	Nevada	25	Energy & Utilities	72.49	70.31	71.28	75.96
302	Mattel	California	32	Consumer Goods	72.44	80.92	70.79	65.71
303	Hecla Mining	Idaho	30	Materials & Chemicals	72.39	77.51	58.89	80.84
304	FactSet	Connecticut	25	Financial	72.37	51.53	73.58	92.06
305	Simpson Manufacturing Company	California	37	Capital Goods	72.36	68.74	77.93	70.49
306	Compass Minerals International	Kansas	31	Materials & Chemicals	72.32	63.98	73.72	79.33
307	Charles River Laboratories	Massachusetts	29	Health Care & Life Sciences	72.31	77.83	74.32	64.86
308	Graphic Packaging	Georgia	32	Materials & Chemicals	72.30	69.00	72.99	74.98
309	GrafTech International	Ohio	38	Capital Goods	72.26	70.28	71.34	75.22
310	KeyCorp	Ohio	26	Financial	72.25	79.85	59.87	77.10
311	Oshkosh	Wisconsin	10	Automotive & Components	72.20	83.53	70.93	62.21
312	Kansas City Southern	Missouri	8	Transport & Logistics	72.11	58.99	79.09	78.29
313	IPG	New York	10	Professional Services	72.10	74.31	60.20	81.88
314	HubSpot	Massachusetts	29	Software & Telecommunications	72.09	79.38	51.36	85.62
315	Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co	Ohio	11	Automotive & Components	72.06	79.69	70.65	65.93
316	Kelly Services	Michigan	11	Professional Services	72.02	70.57	75.11	70.46
317	Sims	New York	33	Materials & Chemicals	71.97	81.05	64.99	69.95
318	Balchem	New York	34	Materials & Chemicals	71.93	58.15	68.02	89.68
319	Coty	New York	33	Consumer Goods	71.90	83.42	72.75	59.62
320	Kraton	Texas	35	Materials & Chemicals	71.90	71.64	70.98	73.15
321	DXC Technology	Virginia	12	Professional Services	71.86	77.45	65.68	72.54
322	Worthington Industries	Ohio	36	Materials & Chemicals	71.83	87.70	54.73	73.14
323	Sanmina	California	37	Technology Hardware	71.77	79.07	54.60	81.73
324	Scotts Miracle-Gro	Ohio	37	Materials & Chemicals	71.76	77.41	69.00	68.94
325	NOV	Texas	26	Energy & Utilities	71.75	69.23	75.85	70.23
326	Columbus McKinnon	New York	39	Capital Goods	71.69	90.94	64.45	59.76
327	U.S. Silica	Texas	38	Materials & Chemicals	71.56	73.65	80.89	60.23
328	Synopsys	California	30	Software & Telecommunications	71.51	69.44	63.52	81.63
329	AECOM	Texas	13	Professional Services	71.46	55.08	80.08	79.28
330	Unifi	North Carolina	39	Materials & Chemicals	71.45	73.50	64.88	76.06
331	Fortive	Washington	40	Capital Goods	71.42	56.89	62.76	94.67
332	Schlumberger NV	Texas	27	Energy & Utilities	71.42	84.88	71.93	57.52
333	Masonite International	Florida	41	Capital Goods	71.40	77.29	67.44	69.54
334	Hologic	Massachusetts	30	Health Care & Life Sciences	71.38	70.30	58.11	85.80
335	Pactiv Evergreen	Illinois	40	Materials & Chemicals	71.36	72.11	70.52	71.53
336	ICF	Virginia	14	Professional Services	71.22	84.39	73.10	56.25
337	Hanesbrands	North Carolina	34	Consumer Goods	71.15	85.83	64.22	63.47
338	Empire State Reality Trust	New York	22	Real Estate & Housing	71.12	80.44	52.81	80.20
339	Union Pacific	Nebraska	9	Transport & Logistics	71.10	83.69	55.96	73.75
340	Williams-Sonoma	California	35	Consumer Goods	71.06	63.28	70.16	79.80
341	National Instruments	Texas	31	Software & Telecommunications	71.04	77.78	67.17	68.26
342	KLA Corporation	California	38	Technology Hardware	71.04	40.06	77.72	95.39
343	Gartner	Connecticut	15	Professional Services	71.02	58.96	67.91	86.23
344	Mid-America Apartment Communities	Tennessee	23	Real Estate & Housing	71.00	85.75	53.15	74.19
345	Steelcase	Michigan	36	Consumer Goods	70.99	87.89	62.94	62.22
346	Molson Coors Brewing	Illinois	37	Consumer Goods	70.96	83.28	66.67	63.00
347	C.H. Robinson	Minnesota	10	Transport & Logistics	70.89	64.19	75.65	72.90
348	Akamai	Massachusetts	32	Software & Telecommunications	70.88	77.93	50.39	84.42
349	Intuitive	California	31	Health Care & Life Sciences	70.88	62.63	77.85	72.21
350	Packaging Corporation of America	Illinois	41	Materials & Chemicals	70.85	63.85	65.47	83.28
351	Ralph Lauren	New York	38	Consumer Goods	70.85	92.11	49.97	70.55
352	Zendesk	California	33	Software & Telecommunications	70.73	65.34	67.87	79.04
353	Silicon Labs	Texas	39	Technology Hardware	70.66	88.89	70.41	52.78
354	SL Green Realty	New York	24	Real Estate & Housing	70.65	78.40	54.94	78.70
355	Dick’s Sporting Goods	Pennsylvania	12	Retail	70.64	71.51	62.01	78.47
356	MSA Safety	Pennsylvania	16	Professional Services	70.50	83.29	67.33	60.97
357	Global Payments	Georgia	27	Financial	70.48	84.15	58.51	68.87
358	Murphy USA	Arkansas	13	Retail	70.44	63.64	71.99	75.76
359	Entergy	Louisiana	28	Energy & Utilities	70.38	44.99	98.15	68.05
360	Essential Utilities	Pennsylvania	29	Energy & Utilities	70.37	80.18	73.40	57.61
361	Howard Hughes	Texas	25	Real Estate & Housing	70.28	74.95	62.10	73.86
362	Palo Alto Networks	California	34	Software & Telecommunications	70.23	77.12	67.24	66.41
363	ONEOK	Oklahoma	30	Energy & Utilities	70.23	63.80	73.13	73.83
364	Dominion Energy	Virginia	31	Energy & Utilities	70.21	50.73	87.56	72.38
365	Brunswick	Illinois	42	Capital Goods	70.18	65.25	64.77	80.60
366	CF Industries Holdings	Illinois	42	Materials & Chemicals	70.17	45.39	73.12	92.05
367	Marsh McLennan	New York	17	Professional Services	70.11	57.73	64.83	87.81
368	Bread Financial	Ohio	28	Financial	70.07	69.06	67.21	74.01
369	Merit Medical Systems	Utah	32	Health Care & Life Sciences	70.07	62.34	72.28	75.64
370	PerkinElmer	Massachusetts	33	Health Care & Life Sciences	70.05	62.75	65.40	82.08
371	Sonoco Products	South Carolina	43	Materials & Chemicals	70.05	85.38	60.12	64.73
372	GoDaddy	Arizona	35	Software & Telecommunications	70.04	71.38	53.77	85.03
373	Ziff Davis	New York	36	Software & Telecommunications	70.02	54.47	68.73	86.90
374	Gentherm	Michigan	12	Automotive & Components	70.01	77.05	62.86	70.19
375	FormFactor	California	40	Technology Hardware	69.95	79.32	50.36	80.26
376	The Cheesecake Factory	California	8	Hotels, Dining & Leisure	69.93	83.33	49.56	76.98
377	Skywork Solutions	California	41	Technology Hardware	69.92	71.89	69.88	68.06
378	Amedisys	Louisiana	34	Health Care & Life Sciences	69.89	67.75	75.15	66.82
379	Booz Allen Hamilton	Virginia	18	Professional Services	69.87	56.47	71.29	81.91
380	Polaris Inc.	Minnesota	13	Automotive & Components	69.84	81.83	66.59	61.19
381	UDR	Colorado	26	Real Estate & Housing	69.84	81.70	60.64	67.26
382	Textron	Rhode Island	43	Capital Goods	69.81	80.61	64.99	63.92
383	Brown-Forman	Kentucky	39	Consumer Goods	69.81	64.39	57.97	87.12
384	KB Home	California	27	Real Estate & Housing	69.77	57.19	75.40	76.77
385	Sensient Technologies	Wisconsin	44	Materials & Chemicals	69.74	68.55	62.27	78.46
386	Winnebago Industries	Iowa	14	Automotive & Components	69.68	61.44	57.24	90.41
387	Burlington	New Jersey	14	Retail	69.61	91.28	60.24	57.40
388	Dentsply Sirona	North Carolina	35	Health Care & Life Sciences	69.60	81.14	76.71	51.02
389	TimkenSteel	Ohio	45	Materials & Chemicals	69.55	68.29	65.25	75.20
390	SunPower	California	32	Energy & Utilities	69.51	70.87	79.44	58.30
391	Discover	Illinois	29	Financial	69.44	69.68	66.23	72.47
392	Meritage Homes	Arizona	28	Real Estate & Housing	69.42	47.71	65.06	95.55
393	EnerSys	Pennsylvania	42	Technology Hardware	69.40	77.98	48.77	81.53
394	Harley-Davidson	Wisconsin	15	Automotive & Components	69.34	78.11	65.68	64.31
395	Terex	Connecticut	44	Capital Goods	69.31	67.08	76.05	64.87
396	Cabot Microelectronics	Illinois	43	Technology Hardware	69.30	84.11	69.35	54.52
397	Clearway Energy	New Jersey	33	Energy & Utilities	69.28	78.64	68.78	60.48
398	DTE Energy	Michigan	34	Energy & Utilities	69.15	56.60	79.67	71.23
399	Franklin Electric	Indiana	44	Technology Hardware	69.13	74.78	69.19	63.49
400	Corporate Office Properties Trust	Maryland	29	Real Estate & Housing	69.02	77.03	68.91	61.19
401	Manitowoc	Wisconsin	45	Capital Goods	68.99	63.32	71.28	72.42
402	MPLX LP	Ohio	35	Energy & Utilities	68.98	61.19	65.11	80.69
403	H&R Block	Missouri	19	Professional Services	68.97	68.06	68.12	70.80
404	Xcel Energy	Minnesota	36	Energy & Utilities	68.92	53.49	78.75	74.58
405	Ameriprise Financial	Minnesota	30	Financial	68.91	62.68	52.94	91.19
406	AMN Healthcare Services	Texas	36	Health Care & Life Sciences	68.89	66.57	68.76	71.40
407	T. Rowe Price	Maryland	31	Financial	68.89	70.43	67.53	68.78
408	T-Mobile	Washington	37	Software & Telecommunications	68.83	92.85	49.87	63.88
409	Lumen Technologies	Louisiana	38	Software & Telecommunications	68.77	74.74	66.61	65.04
410	Renewable Energy Group	Iowa	37	Energy & Utilities	68.76	82.80	78.41	45.16
411	Iridium Communications	Virginia	39	Software & Telecommunications	68.74	81.02	51.46	73.82
412	Blackbaud	South Carolina	40	Software & Telecommunications	68.62	79.13	52.74	74.06
413	Sunstone Hotel Investors	California	30	Real Estate & Housing	68.55	75.49	64.43	65.81
414	Gates Industrial Corporation	Colorado	46	Capital Goods	68.52	69.17	75.14	61.34
415	Thor Industries	Indiana	16	Automotive & Components	68.46	72.18	59.20	74.07
416	International Flavors & Fragrances	New York	46	Materials & Chemicals	68.44	74.92	65.52	64.94
417	Prologis	California	31	Real Estate & Housing	68.40	69.64	68.58	67.06
418	Equinix	California	41	Software & Telecommunications	68.39	63.82	66.86	74.55
419	Vistra Energy	Texas	38	Energy & Utilities	68.38	57.15	80.45	67.60
420	Crestwood	Texas	39	Energy & Utilities	68.32	59.98	83.32	61.72
421	Alnylam	Massachusetts	37	Health Care & Life Sciences	68.32	76.41	69.06	59.56
422	Ceridian	Minnesota	42	Software & Telecommunications	68.29	78.14	63.83	62.97
423	Littelfuse	Illinois	45	Technology Hardware	68.25	78.94	69.89	56.00
424	Brinker International	Texas	9	Hotels, Dining & Leisure	68.24	79.29	56.07	69.43
425	Hersha Hospitality Trust	Pennsylvania	32	Real Estate & Housing	68.13	85.67	56.00	62.82
426	AAR	Illinois	11	Transport & Logistics	68.12	69.48	50.99	83.97
427	Nextera Energy	Florida	40	Energy & Utilities	68.12	56.48	83.89	64.05
428	Tyler Technologies	Texas	43	Software & Telecommunications	68.06	79.96	61.06	63.23
429	NorthWestern Energy	South Dakota	41	Energy & Utilities	68.04	52.94	80.99	70.26
430	Roper Technologies	Florida	46	Technology Hardware	68.01	58.00	65.86	80.22
431	Lincoln National	Pennsylvania	32	Financial	68.00	87.93	67.09	49.08
432	Automatic Data Processing	New Jersey	44	Software & Telecommunications	67.99	60.56	61.02	82.44
433	Taylor Morrison	Arizona	33	Real Estate & Housing	67.98	32.64	80.94	90.39
434	IPG Photonics	New York	47	Technology Hardware	67.98	59.53	66.06	78.40
435	Western Midstream	Texas	42	Energy & Utilities	67.96	53.44	65.69	84.82
436	Hawaiian Electric Industries	Hawaii	43	Energy & Utilities	67.86	53.08	82.37	68.19
437	WESCO International	Pennsylvania	12	Transport & Logistics	67.85	72.48	70.40	60.73
438	Dolby	California	45	Software & Telecommunications	67.84	52.00	70.07	81.50
439	Southwest Airlines	Texas	13	Transport & Logistics	67.73	66.83	61.87	74.56
440	Callaway	California	40	Consumer Goods	67.72	60.19	68.06	74.96
441	Alamo Group	Texas	14	Transport & Logistics	67.70	78.18	60.75	64.24
442	Cooper Tires	Ohio	17	Automotive & Components	67.69	72.69	64.08	66.37
443	Kadant	Massachusetts	48	Technology Hardware	67.68	69.87	52.91	80.33
444	Wolfspeed	North Carolina	48	Technology Hardware	67.68	81.22	65.28	56.61
445	Enphase	California	50	Technology Hardware	67.67	62.95	72.23	67.90
446	Cohu	California	51	Technology Hardware	67.64	65.36	62.12	75.52
447	Sprouts Farmers Market	Arizona	15	Retail	67.63	68.26	62.39	72.32
448	Monolithic Power Systems	Washington	52	Technology Hardware	67.61	62.26	65.60	75.04
449	FIS	Florida	46	Software & Telecommunications	67.50	70.38	52.64	79.55
450	Sleep Number	Minnesota	16	Retail	67.50	70.37	60.66	71.53
451	Synchrony Financial	Connecticut	33	Financial	67.44	59.82	77.39	65.17
452	Paramount Global	New York	10	Hotels, Dining & Leisure	67.39	64.30	68.44	69.48
453	Henry Schein	New York	38	Health Care & Life Sciences	67.35	65.06	61.06	76.00
454	eHealth	California	34	Financial	67.34	69.55	70.94	61.60
455	Livent	Pennsylvania	47	Materials & Chemicals	67.27	73.77	66.67	61.45
456	Carlisle Companies	Arizona	48	Materials & Chemicals	67.16	66.94	53.46	81.15
457	Cooper Companies	California	39	Health Care & Life Sciences	67.16	50.58	72.96	77.98
458	Veeco	New York	53	Technology Hardware	67.15	86.52	44.88	70.13
459	O-I	Ohio	49	Materials & Chemicals	67.11	49.80	77.29	74.29
460	Sealed Air	North Carolina	50	Materials & Chemicals	67.07	68.64	60.19	72.44
461	Cornerstone Building Brands	North Carolina	47	Capital Goods	67.06	75.49	65.00	60.79
462	Pebblebrook Hotel Trust	Maryland	11	Hotels, Dining & Leisure	67.06	79.57	63.71	57.99
463	Gibraltar	New York	48	Capital Goods	67.05	66.84	74.22	60.18
464	Varex Imaging	Utah	40	Health Care & Life Sciences	66.99	69.44	66.64	64.95
465	NRG Energy	Texas	44	Energy & Utilities	66.95	49.30	72.16	79.44
466	Fiserv	Wisconsin	47	Software & Telecommunications	66.89	57.60	66.27	76.88
467	Hawkins	Minnesota	51	Materials & Chemicals	66.74	64.96	61.30	74.03
468	Rogers Corporation	Arizona	52	Materials & Chemicals	66.71	73.98	64.00	62.22
469	HF Sinclaor	Texas	45	Energy & Utilities	66.64	76.65	74.42	48.93
470	MDU Resources	North Dakota	45	Energy & Utilities	66.64	44.75	84.98	70.23
471	National Vision	Georgia	17	Retail	66.59	55.19	59.05	85.60
472	TransUnion	Illinois	20	Professional Services	66.58	83.02	54.37	62.45
473	Paramount Group	New York	34	Real Estate & Housing	66.52	68.00	54.89	76.73
474	Citrix Systems	Florida	48	Software & Telecommunications	66.43	59.43	51.13	88.79
475	ANSYS	Pennsylvania	48	Software & Telecommunications	66.43	69.59	62.45	67.31
476	Intuit	California	50	Software & Telecommunications	66.40	71.16	59.24	68.87
477	Switch	Nevada	54	Technology Hardware	66.36	64.59	66.96	67.59
478	Veritiv	Georgia	53	Materials & Chemicals	66.25	49.46	73.40	75.95
479	Harsco	Pennsylvania	21	Professional Services	66.23	60.21	74.32	64.22
480	Cabot Corporation	Massachusetts	54	Materials & Chemicals	66.21	65.19	71.11	62.39
481	The Hanover	Massachusetts	35	Financial	66.19	68.56	57.99	72.09
482	Americold Realty Trust	Georgia	35	Real Estate & Housing	66.18	75.82	71.67	51.13
483	Centennial	Colorado	47	Energy & Utilities	66.17	50.33	71.01	77.23
484	American Homes 4 Rent	California	36	Real Estate & Housing	66.12	60.80	74.11	63.49
485	Equitrans Midstream	Pennsylvania	48	Energy & Utilities	66.11	56.55	79.73	62.11
486	Avis Budget Group	New Jersey	22	Professional Services	66.09	62.71	65.90	69.73
487	The Container Store	Texas	18	Retail	66.06	77.35	50.85	70.06
488	Advanced Drainage Systems	Ohio	49	Energy & Utilities	66.06	68.08	63.54	66.64
489	QTS	Kansas	37	Real Estate & Housing	66.06	62.22	69.33	66.69
490	Devon Energy	Oklahoma	50	Energy & Utilities	65.93	65.38	67.56	64.92
491	Installed Building Products	Ohio	23	Professional Services	65.92	51.87	69.21	76.73
492	Wabtec	Pennsylvania	15	Transport & Logistics	65.92	60.03	68.94	68.84
493	Caesars Entertainment	Nevada	12	Hotels, Dining & Leisure	65.89	83.16	51.27	63.31
494	Array Technologies	New Mexico	51	Energy & Utilities	65.88	69.13	60.85	67.73
495	New Jersey Resources	New Jersey	52	Energy & Utilities	65.77	56.29	66.16	74.92
496	Range Resources	Texas	53	Energy & Utilities	65.76	57.88	76.68	62.78
497	Hostess Brands	Kansas	41	Consumer Goods	65.68	58.03	68.57	70.52
498	Kontoor Brands	North Carolina	42	Consumer Goods	65.61	54.33	60.66	81.90
499	Greenbrier Companies	Oregon	16	Transport & Logistics	65.60	64.88	67.57	64.42

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Licensing

If your company was listed in the ranking, click here to learn more about the licensing options.METHODOLOGY

THE RANKING AMERICA’S MOST RESPONSIBLE Companies 2023 focuses on a holistic view of corporate responsibility that considers all three pillars of ESG: environment, social and corporate governance.
In total, 500 companies were identified as America’s Most Responsible Companies.The initial analysis focused on the top 2000 public companies by revenue and banks and insurance companies with total assets exceeding $50 billion.

The analysis is based on two metrics:
1. Quantitative data from KPI (key performance indicator) research: More than 30 KPIs from the three areas of CSR (corporate social responsibility) were considered for the ranking.
2. The CSR reputation of each company from an extensive survey of 13,000 U.S. residents: Respondents were asked to select companies familiar to them and then to evaluate the company’s CSR performance in general and in the three sub-dimensions: social, environmental and governance.

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he selection of the companies and the definition of the evaluation criteria were carried out according to independent journalistic criteria of Newsweek and Statista. The evaluation was carried out by the statistics and market research company Statista. Newsweek and Statista make no claim to the completeness of the companies examined.
The ranking is composed exclusively of U.S. companies that are eligible regarding the criteria described here. A position in the ranking is a positive recognition based on research of publicly available data sources at the time, the information provided in the validation survey and an extensive survey of U.S. residents. The ranking is the result of an elaborate process which, due to the interval of data-collection and analysis, is a reflection of official ESG data from 2020 or 2021. Furthermore, events following November 3, 2022 were not a subject of this survey. As such, the results of this ranking should not be used as the sole source of information for future deliberations. The information provided in this ranking should be considered in conjunction with other available information. The quality of companies that are not included in the ranking is not disputed. For a complete methodology see newsweek.com/amrc-2023

ewsweek and Statista make no claim to the completeness of the companies examined.
The ranking is composed exclusively of U.S. companies that are eligible regarding the criteria described here. A position in the ranking is a positive recognition based on research of publicly available data sources at the time, the information provided in the validation survey and an extensive survey of U.S. residents. The ranking is the result of an elaborate process which, due to the interval of data-collection and analysis, is a reflection of official ESG data from 2020 or 2021. Furthermore, events following November 3, 2022 were not a subject of this survey. As such, the results of this ranking should not be used as the sole source of information for future deliberations. The information provided in this ranking should be considered in conjunction with other available information. The quality of companies that are not included in the ranking is not disputed. For a complete methodology see newsweek.com/amrc-2023

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Tags: accountability, corporate social reponsibility, corporate social responsibility, CSR, responsible brands, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands
Categories : reputation management, responsible brands, social responsibility, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands

Green jobs are booming, but too few employees have sustainability skills to fill them – here are 4 ways to close the gap

15 01 2023

U.S. universities now have over 3,000 sustainability programs. Photo: Andy DeLisle/ASU

By Christopher Boone, Professor of Sustainability, Arizona State University and Karen C. Seto, Professor of Geography and Urbanization Science, Yale University from The Conversation. Re-posted: January 15, 2022

To meet today’s global sustainability challenges, the corporate world needs more than a few chief sustainability officers – it needs an army of employees, in all areas of business, thinking about sustainability in their decisions every day.

That means product designers, supply managers, economists, scientists, architects and many others with the knowledge to both recognize unsustainable practices and find ways to improve sustainability for the overall health of their companies and the planet.

Employers are increasingly looking for those skills. We analyzed job ads from a global database and found a tenfold increase in the number of jobs with “sustainability” in the title over the last decade, reaching 177,000 in 2021.

What’s troubling is that there are not enough skilled workers to meet the rapid growth in green and sustainability jobs available.

While the number of “green jobs” grew globally at a rate of 8% per year over the last five years, the number of people listing green skills in their profiles only grew by 6% per year, according to a LinkedIn analysis of its nearly 800 million users.

A man stands beside a 3-D printer in a university lab. — *When employees are trained to think about sustainable materials and processes, they can improve corporate innovation and the bottom line. Photo: Sona Srinarayana/ASU*

As professors who train future workers in sustainability principles and techniques, we see several effective ways for people at all stages of their careers to gain those skills and increase those numbers.

Where sustainability jobs are growing fastest

In the U.S., jobs in the renewable energy and environment sectors, grew by 237%over the last five years. Globally, the transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy is forecast to result in a net increase in jobs for the energy sector.

But green jobs go well beyond solar panel installation and wind turbine maintenance.

Sustainable fashion is one of the fastest-growing green jobs sectors, averaging a 90% growth rate annually between 2016 and 2020.

The rapid expansion of ESG investing – environment, social and governance – and portfolio management is opening up new jobs in sustainable finance. In 2021, the accounting firm PwC announced that it would invest US$12 billion and create 100,000 new jobs in ESG investing by 2026.

There is also a growing demand for urban sustainability officers who can help transition cities to be net-zero carbon and more resilient. After all, the world is adding 1 million people to cities every five days and building 20,000 American football fields’ worth of urban areas someplace on the planet every day.

In 2013, when the Rockefeller Foundation launched 100 Resilient Cities, a network to help cities become more sustainable, few cities had a resilience or sustainability officer. Today, more than 250 communities and 1,000 local government professionals are part of the Urban Sustainability Directors Network.

The number of companies with chief sustainability officers in executive positions also tripled from 9% to 28% between 2016 and 2021. But given the scale and business opportunities of sustainability, these skills are needed much more widely within organizations.

So, where can you find training?

Most sustainability and green jobs require creative problem-solving, synthesizing and technical skills. Some of those skills can be learned on the job, but boosting the number of qualified job applicants will require more effective and accessible training opportunities that target employers’ needs. Here are a some training sources to consider.

University programs: Sustainability is increasingly being incorporated into a wide range of university programs. Fifteen years ago, sustainability training was mostly ad hoc – a product designer or economist might have taken a class in sustainability approaches from the environmental science department. Today, U.S. universities have about 3,000 programs with a “sustainability” label, up from 13 in 2008.

A National Academies report recommends looking for a competency-based approach to sustainability learning that blends content with skills and links knowledge to action to solve problems and develop solutions.

Micro-credentials: For mid-career employees who don’t have the time to reinvest in full-fledged degrees, short courses and micro-credentials offered by universities, colleges or professional groups offer one way to develop sustainability skills.

A micro-credential might involve taking a series of courses or workshops focused on a specific skill, such as in wind energy technology or how to incorporate ESG criteria into business operations.

A group of people wearing hard hats install a large window. — U.S. architect Michael Reynolds holds four-week, hands-on training sessions, primarily for architects, in sustainable design principles, construction methods and philosophy. Participation can count toward Western Colorado University’s Master in Environmental Management graduate degree. Photo: Pablo Porciuncula/AFP via Getty Images

Short courses and micro credentials take up less time and are much less expensive than college degree programs. That may also help lower-income individuals train for sustainability jobs and diversify the field.

Specializations: A similar option is jobs-focused online certificate programs with a sustainability specialization.

For example, Google teamed up with universities to provide online courses for project managers, and Arizona State University is offering a sustainability specialization to accompany it. Project management is an area where the U.S. Department of Labor expects to see fast job growth, with 100,000 job openings in the next decade.

A pile of boxes of various sizes ready for shipping at a FedEx shipping distribution center. — Sustainable packaging design that reduces costs and reuses materials is an area ripe for innovation in many companies as consumer shipping increases.Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

Corporate training: Some companies have developed their own internal sustainability training in climate science, sustainable finance, sustainability reporting and other skills.

Integrating sustainability across all functions of companies will require some level of sustainability training and understanding for most if not all employees. Companies like Starbucks, HSBC, Salesforce and Microsoft have created internal training programs to spread sustainability knowledge and practice throughout their companies, not just for employees who have sustainability in their titles.

Closing the gap

A recent survey by Microsoft and BCG of major companies found that only 43% of sustainability professionals in businesses had sustainability-related degrees, and 68% of sustainability leaders were hired internally.

It’s clear that on-the-job sustainability training and up-skilling will be necessary to fill the growing number of roles inside of companies.

To meet the sustainability skills gap, we believe more training will be required – at colleges and universities, by professional organizations and from employers. Achieving global sustainability and meeting climate change challenges will become more likely as legions of people commit their working hours to sustainability solutions.

To see the original post, follow this link: https://theconversation.com/green-jobs-are-booming-but-too-few-employees-have-sustainability-skills-to-fill-them-here-are-4-ways-to-close-the-gap-193953

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Categories : sustainable brands

Cause Marketing Halo Awards: Social Impact To Build A Better World And Bottom Line

17 02 2016

The 2016 Cause Marketing Halo Awards announced its 42 finalists of programs designed to yield both social and financial dividends. The Gold and Service winners in each of ten categories will be announced at the at the 2016 Cause Marketing Forum Annual Conference in Chicago June 1-2, 2016.

More than 100 entries were received in the Cause Marketing Forum’s competition for North American programs designed to yield social and financial dividends.

Programs named finalists in multiple categories include

Bank of America’s “Pass the Flame” campaign with Special Olympics promoting inclusion of people with intellectual disabilities in sports and in life;
‘Think it Up’ Staples/DonorsChoose.org partnership supporting student-powered, teacher-led projects in classrooms across the country;
‘Gateways and Getaways’, a bird- and flight-centric education program for New York families from JetBlue and the Wildlife Conservation Society;
‘Dementia-Friendly Massachusetts’ which Senior Living Residences developed to help people better understand the challenges of living with dementia;
‘#Unlimited’ a tween-targeted back to school program from Old Navy and Boys & Girls Clubs of America to support summer programming for kids.

The Halo Awards will highlight many of the most innovative programs that companies and causes took at the intersection of profit and purpose last year. Some examples include:

A video game marathon that raised funds to put veterans back to work.
An app that helps autistic children make social and emotional connections.
Canvas shoes turned into artwork to support high school arts programs.
“Thumb Socks” that help persuade teens from texting and

With the proliferation of cause campaigns reaching consumers each day, the Cause Marketing Halo Awards are designed to bring clarity, innovation and best practices to light.

About the Cause Marketing Forum

Now in their fourteenth year, the Cause Marketing Halo Awards are North America’s highest honor in the field of cause marketing. They are presented to US and Canadian companies by the Cause Marketing Forum, a company dedicated to providing business and nonprofit executives with the practical information and connections they need to succeed.

All Halo finalists can be seen online at: http://www.CauseMarketingForum.com/halo2016

original post http://www.csrwire.com/press_releases/38699-These-Corporate-Social-Impact-Programs-Build-a-Better-World-and-the-Bottom-Line

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Categories : corporate social responsibility, reputation management, responsible brands, sustainable branding, sustainable brands

New Survey: Only 10% of Americans trust business to behave ethically.

17 09 2015

96 percent of Americans believe it is important for companies to ensure their employees behave ethically but only 10 percent have trust and confidence in major companies to do what is right.

Pharmaceuticals and health insurance were viewed to be the least trustworthy industries. The most trustworthy were thought to be manufacturing, technology and large retailing.

Princeton Survey Research Associates International’s 2015 Public Affairs Pulse survey polled 1,600 Americans on their attitudes about corporate behavior, big business and small business, the trustworthiness of companies and industries, levels of regulation, and lobbying and politics. The study found the vast majority of the public expects the business sector to think beyond profits and be valuable components of society.

Other interesting findings include:

More than nine in 10 Americans say businesses need to protect the environment, including 76 percent who feel it is very important that businesses limit their environmental damage.
88 percent believe companies should contribute to charities
85 percent believe they should take a leadership role in helping society in ways that go beyond their business operations
39 percent believe it is very important that businesses take more responsibility in helping the government solve problems.

How can companies communicate what they’re doing for these causes? Social media is reportedly the best way that companies can communicate what they are doing for social causes, with 45 percent calling it very effective and 38 percent calling it somewhat effective. Not surprisingly, those under 50 years old were more strongly in favor of social media communication than those over 50.

Only 15 percent say social media has a significant influence on their opinions, while almost 40 percent say it does not influence their opinion at all. Personal experiences as a customer or employee of a major company were the top factors influencing people’s opinions of a business.

Access more of the Princeton Survey here. http://pac.org/pulse/

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Categories : corporate social responsibility, reputation management, responsible brands, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands

TetraPak: Most U.S. Consumers Would Choose Renewable Packaging to Help Mitigate Climate Change

17 08 2015

A new survey suggests U.S. consumers are largely unaware of the severity of global resource scarcity, but their choice of packaging would be impacted if they had readily available information on how renewable materials mitigate climate change.

Tetra Pak and the Global Footprint Network conducted a survey of 1,000 U.S. consumers about their grocery spending habits. An overwhelming 86 percent agreed that if they knew the use of renewable packaging contributed to reducing carbon emissions, it would impact their choice of packaging. Women were particularly motivated to choose renewable packaging options based on this knowledge: 90 percent of females said they would modify their purchasing habits while 77 percent of men did.

According to TetraPak, consumers indicated that they are ready to be held as accountable as government and industry for climate change, and they are ready to support actions to mitigate its harmful effects. While 81 percent of respondents said that no one group is responsible for addressing natural resource constraints, the majority also believes that no single group is doing enough.

“Our survey confirms our belief that with information and education, consumers will respond favorably to the need to pay closer attention to resource challenges and change their individual actions, including making more environmentally responsible decisions around packaging,” said Elizabeth Comere, Director of Environment & Government Affairs for Tetra Pak US and Canada.

The survey also asked respondents about specific actions they would be willing to take to conserve natural resources. The top three responses were:

buying local grown food as much as possible (75 percent)
only buying as much food as a household was going to consume (72 percent)
seeking out food or beverage products that come in renewable packaging (69 percent).

Daily purchasing choices can make a difference, said Mathis Wackernagel, president and co-founder of Global Footprint Network.

“How we meet our basic needs — including food — is a powerful way to shape sustainability. Eating food from local sources and less emphasis on animal-based diets can lower the Ecological Footprint,” he said. “When we buy packaged foods, opting for packaging made from renewable materials also contributes to a lower Ecological Footprint.”

These findings coincide with Earth Overshoot Day, an indicator of when humanity has used up nature’s ‘budget’ for the entire year. Global Footprint Network announced Wednesdaythat we have overshot faster than ever: Overshoot Day moved from early October in 2000 to August 13^th this year.

This survey follows Tetra Pak’s launch of the first carton made entirely from renewable packaging materials last year, and is the latest evidence that consumers desire more sustainable packaging options.

Original article from Sustainable Brands

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Tags: accountability, Climate Change, corporate social reponsibility, customer expectations, customer research, Global Footprint Network, green marketing, green retailing, recycling, renewable packaging, responsible brands, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands, T, TetraPak
Categories : Climate Change, corporate social responsibility, green marketing, reputation management, responsible brands, sustainability, sustainable branding

Tetra Pak introduces milk cartons made entirely from plant based materials.

20 01 2015

Finnish dairy producer, Valio, has become the first company in the world to sell products to consumers in Tetra Pak’s carton packaging made entirely from plant-based materials.

Valio is piloting the Tetra Rex Bio-based packaging for its lactose free semi-skimmed milk drink in retail outlets across Finland until mid-March, and will then use feedback from consumers to decide whether to adopt the cartons more broadly across its chilled product range. Charles Brand, executive vice president of product management & commercial operations for Tetra Pak said: “To finally see fully renewable packages on shop shelves is a fantastic feeling … and bears testimony to the focused efforts of the many customers, suppliers and Tetra Pak employees involved in making this a reality. We have been gradually increasing the use of renewable materials in our packages over the years and that work will continue, as we look for ways to extend the fully-renewable concept to other parts of our portfolio without compromising safety, quality or functionality.”

The cartons are manufactured from a combination of plastics derived from plants and paperboard. It is claimed to be a world first and, says Tetra Pak, is a milestone in its commitment to drive ever-stronger environmental performance across all parts of its portfolio and operations. The low density polyethylene used to create the laminate film for the packaging material and the neck of the opening, together with the high density polyethylene used for the cap, are all derived from sugar cane. These plastics, like the Forest Stewardship Council (FSCTM) certified paperboard, are traceable to their origins. The Tetra Rex fully renewable package can be identified by the words “Bio-based” printed on the gable of the package.

Elli Siltala, marketing director at Valio said: “Valio is committed to increasing the share of renewable resources in its packaging material. We share a common vision of innovation and environmental responsibility with Tetra Pak and we are proud to be the first in the world to make our products available in a fully renewable carton package.” The milk drink will be available in one-litre capacity Tetra Rex Bio-based packages, with a cap made of sugarcane and will use Tetra Pak filling machine.

Post originally appeared on 2 degrees network.

https://www.2degreesnetwork.com/groups/2degrees-community/resources/tetra-paks-fully-renewable-carton-package-hits-shelves/utm_campaign=Editors_Highlights_NL&utm_source=hs_email&utm_medium=email&utm_content=15654923&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-8PkxfQxlCfb3ugb0XJDkrTJsHeYALw88d_X7-oyEXihYmtLCrrdfcBKGy1bO1fLBeVmwJXbMIVMKqyk6zIWM3vW-62nQ&_hsmi=15654923

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Tags: accountability, branding, customer research, green marketing, green retailing, renewable packaging, responsible brands, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands, Tetra Pak, Valio
Categories : corporate social responsibility, green marketing, responsible brands, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands

Timberland Tires: A Brand With An End Game in Mind

4 11 2014

Timberland’s partnership with Omni United will create co-branded automotive tires specifically designed to be recycled into footwear outsoles when their road journey is complete.

According to a joint press announcement, Timberland and Omni United first conceived this partnership three years ago, when sustainability leaders from both brands came together to address a longstanding shared concern. The tire and footwear industries are two of the largest users of virgin rubber. The majority of tires on the market today have a limited life span; ecologically-sound disposal at the end of that life span presents yet another challenge.

In a statement, Stewart Whitney, president of Timberland said, “Our partnership with Omni United marks a new day for the tire and footwear industries. An outdoor lifestyle brand and an automotive industry leader may, at first blush, seem unlikely partners – yet our shared values have given birth to tires that express a lifestyle, deliver performance and safety, and prove that sustainability can be so much more than a theory. It’s this kind of cross-industry collaboration that’s fueling real change and innovation in the marketplace.”

G.S. Sareen, president and CEO of Omni United said, “Omni United and Timberland are taking an entirely different view of sustainability by designing Timberland Tires for a second life from the outset. That is one of the reasons why establishing a take-back and recycling program before the first tire is sold – and choosing an appropriate rubber formulation for recycling the tires into footwear – is so critical. Our intent is to capture every worn Timberland Tire and recycle it for a second life, so none is used as fuel or ends up in a landfill.”

To bring the tire-to-shoe continuum to life, Timberland and Omni United have established an industry-first tire return/chain of custody process, to ensure the tires go directly to dedicated North American recycling facilities to begin their path toward a second life as part of a Timberland^® product. Key steps include:

Tire retailers will set aside used Timberland Tires for recycling after consumers purchase new tires to replace their worn out tires.
Omni United is partnering with Liberty Tire Recycling and its network of tire collection and recycling firms to sort and segregate the Timberland Tires at the companies’ facilities.
The used tires will be shipped to a North American tire recycling facility where they will be recycled into crumb rubber.
The crumb rubber will be processed further into sheet rubber for shipment to Timberland outsole manufacturers.
The rubber will be mixed into a Timberland-approved compound for outsoles that will ultimately be incorporated into Timberland^® boots and shoes. This blended compound will meet the company’s exacting standards for quality and performance, as well as its stringent compliance standards.

Timberland Tires will be sold initially in the United States at leading national and regional tire retailers, as well as online through a state-of-the-art e-commerce platform.

For more information about Timberland Tires, visit www.timberlandtires.com.

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Tags: accountability, branding, corporate social reponsibility, corporate social responsibility, CSR, energy efficiency, green marketing, marketing, Omni United, recycled tires, recycling, responsible brands, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands, Timberland
Categories : corporate social responsibility, green marketing, reputation management, responsible brands, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands

The North Face: This Land Is Your Land

27 10 2014

In a new campaign celebrating the benefits of the great outdoors, The North Face introduces a video today encouraging city dwellers to embrace nature and the environment. Using Woody Guthrie’s venerable This Land Is Your Land reworked by My Morning Jacket, the campaign subtly demonstrates the uplifting benefits of outdoor activity.

The centerpiece of the campaign is the 90 second video. The spot closes with the store’s long-running slogan, “Never stop exploring,” and urges consumers to download the new recording of the song from iTunes. The download will cost $1.29, with Apple pocketing its customary third and the rest going to the 21st Century Conservation Service Corps within the United States Interior Department, which hires veterans and at-risk young people to restore and preserve public land. Additionally, the retailer is contributing $250,000 to the corps.

Source: The New York Times

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Tags: accountability, branding, green marketing, marketing, marketing and communications, North Face, responsible brands, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands, This Land Is Your Land
Categories : corporate social responsibility, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands

Nielsen: Doing Well By Doing Good

3 07 2014

55% of global respondents in Nielsen’s corporate social responsibility survey were willing to pay extra for products and services from companies committed to positive social and environmental impact—an increase from 45% in 2011. However, people living in North America lag the global average, with only 42% saying they would be willing to pay extra – a 7% increase from three years ago.

As continued impactful climate change events and social consciousness raises people’s concern about companies’ impact on society, the importance of brand’s corporate responsibility reputations will continue to rise. Brands which act responsibly and communicate those actions effectively will increasingly be the ones rewarded by consumers.

Images: Future Leaders in Philanthropy, Nielsen

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Categories : reputation management, responsible brands, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands

WHO: 1 in 8 Global Deaths Linked To Air Pollution

8 04 2014

The World Health Organization reports that in 2012 around 7 million people died – one in eight of total global deaths – as a result of air pollution exposure. This finding more than doubles previous estimates and confirms that air pollution is now the world’s largest single environmental health risk.

Reducing air pollution could save millions of lives.

The new data reveal a strong link between air pollution exposure and cardiovascular diseases and cancer. The new estimates are not only based on more knowledge about the diseases caused by air pollution, but also upon better assessment of human exposure to air pollutants through the use of improved measurements and technology. This has enabled scientists to make a more detailed analysis of health risks from a wider demographic spread that now includes rural as well as urban areas.

“Cleaning up the air we breathe prevents non-communicable diseases as well as reduces disease risks among women and vulnerable groups, including children and the elderly,” says Dr Flavia Bustreo, WHO Assistant Director-General Family, Women and Children’s Health. “Poor women and children pay a heavy price from indoor air pollution since they spend more time at home breathing in smoke and soot from leaky coal and wood cook stoves.”

“The risks from air pollution are now far greater than previously thought or understood, particularly for heart disease and strokes,” says Dr Maria Neira, Director of WHO’s Department for Public Health, Environmental and Social Determinants of Health. “Few risks have a greater impact on global health today than air pollution; the evidence signals the need for concerted action to clean up the air we all breathe.”

After analysing the risk factors and taking into account revisions in methodology, WHO estimates indoor air pollution was linked to 4.3 million deaths in 2012 in households cooking over coal, wood and biomass stoves. The new estimate is explained by better information about pollution exposures among the estimated 2.9 billion people living in homes using wood, coal or dung as their primary cooking fuel, as well as evidence about air pollution’s role in the development of cardiovascular and respiratory diseases, and cancers.

In the case of outdoor air pollution, WHO estimates there were 3.7 million deaths in 2012 from urban and rural sources worldwide.

Many people are exposed to both indoor and outdoor air pollution. Due to this overlap, mortality attributed to the two sources cannot simply be added together, hence the total estimate of around 7 million deaths in 2012.

“Excessive air pollution is often a by-product of unsustainable policies in sectors such as transport, energy, waste management and industry. In most cases, healthier strategies will also be more economical in the long term due to health-care cost savings as well as climate gains,” says Dr Carlos Dora, WHO Coordinator for Public Health, Environmental and Social Determinants of Health. “WHO and health sectors have a unique role in translating scientific evidence on air pollution into policies that can deliver impact and improvements that will save lives.”

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Tags: accountability, air pollution, Climate Change, corporate social reponsibility, corporate social responsibility, CSR, responsible brands, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands, WHO
Categories : Climate Change, corporate social responsibility, reputation management, responsible brands

Brandkarma: A new Global Reputation System for Brands

7 03 2014

“Brands often fall short of their potential to do good – reputation without responsibility. Brandkarma will change that.”

Upendra Shardanand, founder Daylife

Welcome Brandkarma.com – the first social community that will rate and review brands ability to do good in the world.

Consumer research has repeatedly demonstrated that people expect businesses to operate responsibly and to contribute to positive change in the world. Many people say that if brands fail to operate responsibly, they will stop purchasing the products that the brand provides.

Brandkarma.com was launched to empower consumers to better translate those beliefs into action. Brandkarma.com allows consumers to see brands holistically – not only the quality of their products but the brand behaviors toward their employees, their community and the planet at large.

visit brand karma.com here

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Categories : corporate social responsibility, reputation management, responsible brands, social responsibility, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands

SOGB: Business Sustainability Progress Has Stalled

27 01 2014

According to the 2014 State of Green Business report published by GreenBiz Group in partnership with Trucost plc., companies around the world are struggling to make progress on climate change, resource efficiency and natural capital dependency.

“While more and more companies are undertaking a growing number of initiatives to reduce their environmental impacts, there’s very little progress to show for it. Company initiatives are not having an impact at the scale needed to address such challenges as climate change and the availability of water and natural resources,” said Joel Makower, GreenBiz Group executive editor and the report’s principal author.

The seventh annual edition of the report, which measures the global progress of large, publicly traded companies in addressing a myriad of environmental challenges, reveals little meaningful progress across most metrics, including greenhouse gas emissions, water use, waste disposal and other pollutant impacts.

“The environmental impacts of business – air pollution, biodiversity loss, ecosystem degradation and water scarcity – are threatening the ability of our finite stock of natural capital to deliver sustainable growth,” said Richard Mattison, CEO of Trucost. “The challenge for business is to identify growth models that result in reduced environmental impact.

”The report also names the 10 sustainable business trends for 2014. Among them are the growth of collaboration among big corporations to solve mutual sustainability challenges, the growth of chemical transparency for consumer products, the emergence of “shadow pricing” as a means for companies to assess their environmental risks and net-positive buildings.

The 2014 report includes the launch of the Natural Capital Leaders Index, a new methodology for identifying companies that are growing their revenue while reducing their environmental impacts. The 2014 Index found 34 companies from 10 countries that met Trucost’s criteria, which include increasing revenue between 2008 and 2012, disclosure of greenhouse gas emissions and a decrease in environmental impacts during that same period.Among the 34 “decoupling leaders” are Carnival Corp., CSX, Intel, Kimberly-Clark, National Australia Bank, Pearson, Tata Power and Verizon.The Index further identifies US and Global “efficiency leaders” that use the least natural capital to generate revenue compared to sector peers – the more traditional sustainability leaders – which include Adobe Systems, AMEC, BMW, Ford, Manpower, McGraw Hill Financial, Pepco Holdings and Sprint Corp.The metrics from the report were drawn from Trucost’s assessment of 4,600 of the world’s largest companies representing 93% of global markets by market capitalization.The State of Green Business report will be the centrepiece of the upcoming GreenBiz Forum (Feb 18-20), taking place in Phoenix, AZ, where speakers will address many of these trends and metrics.The free report can be downloaded from GreenBiz.com.

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Categories : corporate social responsibility, reputation management, responsible brands, sustainable brands

CCC: Enhanced Reputation Key Goal of CSR Efforts.

17 01 2014

New reports cites increased funding, senior leadership appointments, management engagement and reputation enhancement goals for corporate citizenship. The Center for Corporate Citizenship has released its The Profile of the Practice 2013. The report explores how the environmental, social, and governance (ESG) dimensions of business—corporate citizenship—are managed in today’s business world, and how these practices have evolved since the last report in 2010.

“Corporate citizenship is managed at higher levels, corporate citizenship leaders are better compensated, and more companies establish both board committees and official budgeted departments to manage their programs,” said Katherine Smith, Executive Director, Boston College Center for Corporate Citizenship said in a statement. “These are all signs that CSR continues to be more deeply embedded in business as more executives realize that positive environmental, social and governance measures correlate to positive financial performance, improved reputation, and solid risk management.”

Among the key findings in the survey:

More than 70% of companies cited enhanced reputation among the top three business goals they are trying to achieve through their corporate citizenship efforts. The next most frequently cited goals are improving employee retention (45%), improving employee recruitment (41%), attracting new customers (33%), and improving risk management (22%).
The chief executive is more involved in developing strategy, setting goals, and communicating corporate citizenship than reported in both 2008 and 2010. More than 25% indicate that their chief executive is highly involved in corporate citizenship program evaluation.
Almost 100% of companies have a corporate citizenship budget today, while just 81% reported being budgeted in 2010.
Almost 60% of companies have an executive leading corporate citizenship. This is a 74% increase over what was reported in 2010. Close to one-third of corporate citizenship leaders are within one level of the chief executive.

The survey was conducted in the Fall of 2013 of 231 companies and their corporate citizenship strategies, operational structures, and business practices were analyzed.

About the Center for Corporate Citizenship

The Carroll School of Management Center for Corporate Citizenship at Boston College is a membership-based knowledge center. Founded in 1985, the Center has a history of leadership in corporate citizenship research and education. The Center engages more than 400 member companies and more than 10,000 individuals annually to share knowledge and expertise about the practice of corporate citizenship through the Center’s professional development programs, online community, regional programs, and annual conference. The Center is a GRI-Certified Training Partner. For more information, visit the Center’s website at www.BCCorporateCitizenship.org.

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National Research Council: Abrupt, near-term impacts to rival dinosaur extinction

10 12 2013

With little fanfare and a noticeable lack of press coverage, the National Research Council released its report: Abrupt Impacts of Climate Change: Anticipating Surprises last week. The 200 page report suggests that a wave of species extinctions rivaling the dinosaurs’ demise might well be coming within the century — and that the time has come to set up early warning systems to detect this and other imminent climate catastrophes.

One of the authors, Anthony Barnosky, made this comment on the report: “Our report focuses on abrupt change, that is, things that happen within a few years to decades: basically, over short enough time scales that young people living today would see the societal impacts brought on by faster-than-normal planetary changes.”

The study was sponsored by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, National Science Foundation, U.S. intelligence community and the National Academies, which is made up of The National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, Institute of Medicine and National Research Council.

Abrupt Changes Already Underway

Some of the abrupt changes are already taking place, according to the report.

The disappearance of late-summer sea ice in the Arctic, with predictions that it may be gone entirely within decades, which “would have potentially large and irreversible effects of various components of the Arctic East Coast system including disruptions in the marine food web, shifts and habitats of summary mammals, and erosion of vulnerable coastlines.”

Because the Arctic region interacts with a large-scale circulation systems of the ocean and atmosphere, changes in the extent of sea ice could cause shifts in climate and weather around the northern hemisphere. The Arctic is also region of increasing economic importance for diverse range of stakeholders, and reductions in Arctic sea ice will bring new legal and political challenges this navigation routes for commercial shipping open and marine access to the region increases for offshore oil and gas development, tourism, fishing and other activities.

Rapidly increasing extinction of plant and animal species at a rate already “probably as fast as any warming event in the past 65 million years, and it is projected that its pace over the next 30 to 80 years will continue to be faster and more intense.” The report cites the following scenarios for species extinction.

If unchecked, habitat destruction, fragmentation, and over-exploitation, even without climate change, could result in a mass extinction within the next few centuries equivalent in magnitude to the one that wiped out the dinosaurs. With the ongoing pressures of climate change, comparable levels of extinction conceivably could occur before the year 2100; indeed, some models show a crash of coral reefs from climate change alone as early as 2060 under certain scenarios.

Destabilization of the west Antarctic ice sheet, an “abrupt change of unknown probability,” carries the threat of sea-level rise “at a rate several times faster than those observed today. “

Early Warning System

In the face of these threats, the report urges development of an Abrupt Change Early Warning System (ACEWS) to closely monitor signals of tipping points drawing near, digest the data and feed it into the best predictive models that can be developed. “We watch our streets, we watch our banks,” the report’s chief author, climatologist James White of the University of Colorado at Boulder, told the Los Angeles Times. “But we do not watch our environment with the same amount of care and zeal.” In a press statement releasing the report, Mr. White said “The time has come for us to quit talking and take action. Right now we don’t know what many of these thresholds are. But with better information, we will be able to anticipate some major changes before they occur and help reduce the potential consequences.”

The executive summary of the report concludes with this rather dire warning:

“Although there is much to learn about climate change and abrupt impacts, to willingly ignore the threat of abrupt change could lead to more costs, loss of life, suffering and environmental degradation. The time is here to be serious about the threat of the tipping points so as to better anticipate and prepare ourselves for the inevitable surprises.”

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Tags: Abrupt Climate Change, accountability, Climate Change, corporate social responsibility, global warming, National Research Council, responsible brands, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands
Categories : Climate Change, corporate social responsibility, responsible brands, social responsibility, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands

Project Sunlight: Unilever’s Call To Action For Sustainable Living

21 11 2013

Unilever has launched a worldwide new initiative to motivate millions of people to adopt more sustainable lifestyles. Launched yesterday on Universal Children’s Day in Brazil, India, Indonesia, the UK and the US, Project Sunlight aims to make sustainable living desirable and achievable by inspiring people, and in particular parents, to join what Unilever sees as a growing community of people who want to make the world a better place for children and future generations.

Project Sunlight was launched with the four-minute film embedded here and created by DAVID Latin America and Ogilvy & Mather London at dawn on November 20th in Indonesia and then follow the sun to India, the UK, Brazil and the US. Additional information can be found at an online hub – www.projectsunlight.com – which brings together the social mission stories of Unilever’s brands across the world, and invites consumers to get involved in doing small things that help their own families, others around the world and the planet.

To mark the launch of Project Sunlight on Universal Children’s Day, Unilever will be helping 2 million children through its ongoing partnerships, providing school meals through the World Food Programme; supporting Save the Children to provide clean, safe drinking water; and improved hygiene through UNICEF.

Ogilvy & Mather Chairman and CEO Miles Young, explains: “Unilever asked us to find a new way to talk about sustainability that would make the benefits real for ordinary people. Project Sunlight is founded on the principle that even small actions can make a big difference and that together, we can create a brighter future. We are honored to be a part of such a positive and significant movement for the good of our client and our communities.” Famed film director Erroll Morris directed “Why bring a child into this world?” including moving interviews with expectant parents from around the world.

The project draws on the legacy of Unilever’s founder Lord Leverhulme, who believed that he could change the world with a brand of soap he called Sunlight.

Kudos to Unilever, Ogilvy, DAVID and everyone involved in this important initiative that hits at the heart of the matter: if we can’t work to improve living conditions on our precious planet, how dare you bring a child into this world.

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Tags: accountability, Climate Change, corporate social reponsibility, corporate social responsibility, CSR, global warming, green marketing, marketing, marketing and communications, Project Sunlight, reputation management, responsible brands, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands, unilever
Categories : reputation management, responsible brands, social responsibility, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands

86% of Americans Expect Food and Beverage Brands To Actively Help Recycle Their Packaging.

12 11 2013

An overwhelming majority of Americans want brands to get engaged in creating and implementing recycling programs, according to a new survey of 1000 adults by the Carton Council of North America (CCNA).

In a statement, Jason Pelz, VP of environment at Tetra Pak North America, and VP of recycling projects for the CCNA said, “First and foremost, this survey reiterates the importance of including a recycling message on product packaging. In an increasingly competitive and green‑minded climate, consumers are revealing they expect food and beverage brands to actively help increase the recycling of their packages.”

U.S. consumers also indicated that they look first to the products they purchase for environmental information, ahead of other resources, with the vast majority (76 percent) consulting a product’s packaging to learn if a package is recyclable, followed by the product’s company website (33 percent) and the consumer’s city website (26 percent).

Importantly, 45% say their loyalty to food and beverage brands would be impacted by that brand’s engagement with environmental causes.

The Carton Council is leading a national effort to increase access to carton recycling in the U.S. In 2009, 21 million U.S. households had access to carton recycling in 26 states. Now, 52.5 million households in 45 states can recycle cartons, a 150 percent increase that includes 64 of the nation’s top 100 cities. Food and beverage brands that use cartons for their products are encouraged to join this effort, especially in helping promote carton recycling to their customers. CCNA can provide companies with tools to inform their customers — from the first step, which is adding the recycling logo to packages and recycling information on their websites, to an extensive list of possibilities beyond that.

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Tags: accountability, cause marketing, CCNA, corporate social responsibility, CSR, customer expectations, customer research, green marketing, green retailing, marketing, recycling, renewable packaging, reputation management, responsible brands, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands
Categories : corporate social responsibility, green marketing, reputation management, responsible brands, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands

Survey Shows Weak Collaboration Around Sustainability In Companies

11 11 2013

BSR/GlobeScan of 700+ corporate sustainability executives in companies worldwide shows decreasing levels of collaboration between sustainability functions and other core corporate functions.

Survey respondents note a lower level, and decreasing, engagement between sustainability functions and corporate functions, such as investor relations (with 37 percent of those surveyed saying they engage with investor relations, down 1 point from 2011), human resources (34 percent, down 3 points), R&D (32 percent, down 9 points), marketing (28 percent, down 14 points). The weakest area of engagement is between corporate sustainability and finance at 16 percent, down 2 points from 2011. Unless greater collaboration is made in this area, the business case for sustainability and its potential positive impact on financial performance will be very difficult to make.

“The trend toward weaker engagement between sustainability functions and core functions such as finance, marketing, HR, investor relations, and R&D, is concerning.” Chris Coulter, CEO at GlobeScan, noted, “Not only is engagement limited with these strategic areas, but collaboration between them and sustainability teams has declined—in some cases by a significant margin. While there is a clear need for external collaboration, there is an equally important case to be made for greater internal collaboration.”

Additional topline findings from this survey include:

When asked to choose which sustainability issues need collaboration the most, climate change and public policy frameworks promoting sustainability are ranked highest.
Only one in five companies has fully integrated sustainability into business.
Engagement between sustainability functions and corporate functions such as marketing, R&D, and finance remains very low.
Collaboration by BSR member companies focuses more often on engagement with NGOs and other businesses than it does on engagement with government.

Fewer companies collaborate often with governments (46 percent) or media (27 percent), both of which are rated as the most difficult partners for collaboration.

21 percent report that their company is close to full integration. A majority say that their company is either about halfway to integration (51 percent), or is just getting started (22 percent).

“The survey reveals both the sense of urgency to address climate change, and the sense that meaningful progress goes well beyond the steps a single company can take,” observed Aron Cramer, President and CEO of BSR. “No one sector—not business, government, civil society, or consumers—can ‘save us’ from climate change.

State_of_Sustainable_Business_Poll_2013_Full_Report__BSR_Globescan

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Tags: accountability, BSR, Climate Change, corporate social responsibility, CSR, GlobeScan, marketing, marketing and communications, responsible brands, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands
Categories : Climate Change, corporate social responsibility, social responsibility, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands

One Year After Sandy: Companies Push White House On Climate Action Plan

29 10 2013

20 leading corporations – including Starbucks, Levis, Unilever and Mars -call on President Obama to follow through on climate change preparedness efforts outlined in the Climate Action Plan announced by the President on June 25th.

The corporate signatories of the letter, which rely on the stability of global supply chains for growth and profitability, cited the economic impacts of severe weather events on company operations and called for ongoing and significant investments to be made in strengthening climate change resiliency both in the United States and the world’s most vulnerable countries. Many of the signatories are members of Business for Innovative Climate & Energy Policy – a group of businesses advocating for meaningful energy and climate legislation.

Critical components of President Obama’s Climate Action Plan included federal investments in climate science, and support for disaster planning and risk management in multiple sectors. On the anniversary of one of the most catastrophic weather events in history, the companies reiterated the need for federal funding of programs and projects that benefit the most vulnerable communities and the businesses they rely on for employment, products and services.

“Our businesses depend upon a resilient infrastructure, resilient communities, and resilient value chains,” the companies wrote in a letter to President Obama today. “In recent years, severe weather events, combined with rising temperatures, have devastated critical infrastructure, decreased crop yields, and threatened water supplies. These trends are being felt globally… We call upon your administration to follow through on commitments for robust support of climate change resilience efforts.”

“Public investment in climate resilience is critical to the economic viability of companies we invest in that rely on consumers, labor, raw materials, and operations located in regions susceptible to extreme weather,” said Bennett Freeman, SVP for Sustainability Research and Policy at Calvert Investments. “We applaud the U.S. government for making investments in resilience and hope to see this strengthened in future years.”

“Extreme weather trends pose challenges to managing reliable supply chains and business planning,” said Anna Walker, Senior Director, Government Affairs and Public Policy at Levi Strauss & Co. “While Levi Strauss & Co. is committed to addressing its climate impact, we believe U.S. government leadership is essential for widespread action on climate resilience to strengthen communities and minimize economic disruption.”

The signatories recognized the Obama Administration’s efforts thus far to address climate change, and expressed support for public and private sector collaboration to continue advancing the implementation of the Climate Action Plan.

“The human and economic costs of severe weather are escalating and it is increasingly important that business and communities integrate climate risk into their operational and decision-making processes,” said Mark Way, Head of Sustainability Americas at Swiss Re America. “As experts on risk, everything we see points to the fact that climate change is something we simply cannot ignore.”

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Tags: Climate Action Plan, Climate Change, corporate social reponsibility, corporate social responsibility, CSR, responsible brands, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands
Categories : Climate Change, corporate social responsibility, responsible brands, social responsibility, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands

The Aspirational Consumer: 2.5 Billion People Redefining Responsible Consumption

8 10 2013

A new global consumer study confirms the rise of nearly 2.5 billion consumers globally who are uniting style, social status and sustainability values to redefine consumption.

According to the report by BBMG, GlobeScan and SustainAbility : The 2013 Aspirational Consumer Index – more than one-third of consumers globally (36.4%) identify as Aspirationals, defined by their love of shopping (78%), desire for responsible consumption (92%) and their trust in brands to act in the best interest of society (58%). The study draws from a telephone and in-person survey of more than 21,000 consumers across 21 international markets conducted in April 2013.

According to Eric Whan, Sustainability Director at GlobeScan, “Aspirationals are materialists who define themselves in part through brands and yet they believe they have a responsibility to purchase products that are good for the environment and society. By engaging Aspirational consumers, brands can further the shift toward more sustainable consumption and influence behavior change at scale.”

Key characteristics of Aspirational consumers include:

Trust in Brands: Nearly six in ten Aspirational consumers globally say they “trust global companies to act in the best interest of society” (58%), compared with 52% of all consumers;

Seek Style and Status: Three-fourths of Aspirational consumers say “I want to stand out by the way I look, my style” (73%), compared to 53% of all consumers;

Positive Influencers: Nearly nine in ten Aspirational consumers say “I encourage others to buy from socially and environmentally responsible companies” (88%), compared to 63% of all consumers;

Empowered Shoppers: Nearly eight in ten Aspirational consumers say “shopping for new things excites me” (78%), compared to 48% of all consumers, and believe they “can change how a company behaves based on my purchase decisions” (78%), compared with 66% of all consumers;

Responsible Consumers: Nine in ten Aspirational consumers say “I believe we need to consume less to preserve the environment for future generations” (92%), compared to 75% of all consumers, and that they are “willing to pay more for products produced in a socially and environmentally responsible way” (91%) compared to 64% of all consumers;

Young and Urban: Demographically, Aspirational consumers make up the largest percentage of Millennial (40%) and GenX (37%) generations, compared to 32% and 33% in the general population, respectively, and nearly six and ten (59%) live in cities; and

Strength in Emerging Markets: Countries with the largest populations of Aspirational consumers include China (46%), Nigeria (45%), Pakistan (44%), India (42%), Australia (41%), Canada (40%), Indonesia (38%), Greece (37%), France (36%), USA (36%), Turkey (35%) and the UK (34%).

“Driven by young, optimistic consumers in emerging markets and amplified by technology and social media’s influence, Aspirationals represent a powerful shift in sustainable consumption from obligation to desire,” said Raphael Bemporad, co-founder and chief strategy officer at brand innovation consultancy BBMG. “With Aspirationals, the sustainability proposition has changed from being the ‘right thing to do’ to being the ‘cool thing to do,’ and brands have a profound opportunity to harness sustainable design and societal values to inspire the next generation of commerce and create positive impact in the world.”

“For decades, green marketers have been speaking to the wrong consumers, assuming that by engaging the most committed ‘advocates’ we would create significant business growth, cultural relevance and change at scale,” Bemporad added. “What makes Aspirationals so compelling is that they combine an authentic commitment to sustainability with a love of shopping, design and social status, aligning economic, cultural and social forces to shift the way we shop.”

“With 2.5 billion consumers worldwide, Aspirationals offer an important opportunity to redefine sustainable consumption,” said Mark Lee, Executive Director at SustainAbility. “Like never before, brands can engage Aspirationals to pioneer new models and practices that can deliver economic growth while reducing negative impacts on the environment.”

Read the original press release on CSR Wire.

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Tags: accountability, Aspirational Consumer, BBMG, branding, cause marketing, corporate social reponsibility, CSR, customer expectations, customer research, GlobeScan, green marketing, green retailing, marketing, marketing and communications, reputation management, responsible brands, retail marketing, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands
Categories : corporate social responsibility, reputation management, social responsibility, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands

Stay or Stall? Great Lakes Oil Shipping On Hold….For Now.

24 09 2013

This week it was announced that a proposed crude oil shipping terminal on Lake Superior has been put on hold. The proposed terminal would have shipped crude oil from the Bakken fields in North Dakota to be loaded onto oil tankers to be shipped to the East Coast. As preposterous as this idea was in the first place, public pressure needs to be raised and continued to ensure that this proposal never comes up again. Be it feasible or not.

Adolph Ojard, executive director of the Duluth Seaway Port Authority, was quoted in an article in the Minneapolis Star Tribune: “It was one of those things that was a trial balloon being floated out there. Economically, I don’t know if it really makes sense to move crude oil on the Great Lakes given the current conditions. It’s more efficient to move it by rail and pipeline.”

Thank god. But economic conditions change and this idea needs to be permanently put to bed through public pressure and legislation. There is much more at stake than economics.

Consider the Facts:

The Great Lakes make up the largest body of fresh water on Earth.

The Great Lakes contain one fifth of the freshwater surface on the planet, some 6 quadrillion gallons and 5,500 cubic miles of water.

The United States draws more than 40 billion gallons of water from the Great Lakes every day.

More than 35 million people rely on the Great Lakes for drinking water.

The Great Lakes support a $7 billion fishery industry and $16 billion tourism industry.

More than 800 toxic contaminants have already been identified in the Great Lakes water and sediment.

Even with these facts in hand, oil thirsty prospectors would consider shipping oil across this precious freshwater resource. Many, many people would be thirsty if this plan goes ahead and inevitably awry.

Dangerous Waters

The combination of severe storms and unpredictable underwater topography make the Great Lakes on of the most dangerous bodies of water for navigation in the world. The Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum approximates 6,000 ships have been lost – while historian and mariner Mark Thompson has estimated that the total number of wrecks is likely more than 25,000. In the modern period between 1816, when the Invincible was lost, to the sinking of the Fitzgerald in 1975, the Whitefish Point area alone has claimed at least 240 ships. Proposed oil tankers necessarily would sail past Whitefish Point on Lake Superior from the terminal in Superior, Wisconsin to the Soo Locks.

What We Learned In Alaska

Wildlife, economies and people are still recovering from the devastating natural and economic disaster from a single wreck of the oil tanker Exxon Valdez in Prince William Sound in Alaska. It is considered to be one of the most devastating human-caused environmental disasters. The Valdez spill was the largest ever in US waters until the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill in terms of volume. Prince William Sound’s remote location, accessible only by helicopter, plane, or boat, made government and industry response efforts difficult and severely taxed existing plans for response. Many parts of the Great Lakes are equally inaccessible.

In 1991, following the collapse of the local marine population (particularly clams, herring, and seals) the Chugach Alaska Corporation, filed for bankruptcy protection. It has since recovered. According to several studies funded by the state of Alaska, the spill had both short-term and long-term economic effects. These included the loss of sports fisheries, reduced tourism, and an estimate of what economists call “existence value“, which is the value to the public of a pristine Prince William Sound. The economy of the city of Cordova, Alaska was adversely affected after the spill damaged stocks of fish in the area. Several residents, including one former mayor, committed suicide after the spill.

But the disaster that was the Exxon Valdez happened in salt water. People don’t drink salt water.

Share this article with any Great Lakes residents and lovers that you know. Write your Congressman. Start your own campaign. If you are concerned about your future and the future of your family, please get engaged to prevent crude oil shipping on the Great Lakes.

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Tags: corporate social reponsibility, CSR, Great Lakes, Great Lakes oil shipping, responsible brands, sustainability
Categories : corporate social responsibility, social responsibility, sustainability

United Nations: CEOs say sustainability less important.

24 09 2013

In a massive new study which interviewed 1,000 CEOs around the world, The United Nations and Accenture report that only 32% of CEOs believe the global economy is on track to meet the demands of a growing population within global environmental and resource constraints. Alarmingly, the number of CEOs of saying that sustainability is “very important” to their business success dropped to 45%, a decline from 54% just three years ago.

The third United Nations Global Compact – Accenture CEO Study On Sustainability 2013 points to CEOs concern about an uncertain global economic climate as directly impacting the urgency of addressing sustainable business operations. Despite the report that 63% of CEOs expect sustainability to transform their business within five years – and 76% believe that embedding sustainability into core business will drive revenue growth and new opportunities – many struggle with market expectations, investor pressure and the difficulty of measuring the business value of sustainability.

The report demonstrates how the world’s CEOs are conflicted on the extent to which they believe that business is making sufficient efforts to address sustainability. with 33% agreeing business is making the acceptable effort, while 38% disagree. See the report chart below:

In an executive summary of the CEO survey, the authors conclude:

“CEOs clearly recognize the scale of the global challenge—but may not yet see the urgency or the incentive for their own businesses to do more and to have a greater impact. This disconnect suggests that a gap persists between the approach to sustainability of the majority of companies globally—an approach centered on philanthropy, compliance, mitigation and the license to operate—and the approach being adopted by leading companies, focused on innovation, growth and new sources of value.”

Other key findings in the report include:

83% of CEOs see an increase in efforts by governments and policy makers to provide an enabling environment for the private sector as integral to advancing sustainability.
85% of CEOs demand clearer policy and market signals to support green growth.
Only 29% of CEOs regard climate change as one of the most important sustainability challenges for the future of their business
And just 14% regard water sanitation as an important issue for their business to address.

Clearly the lack of progress on the global economy and the failure of governments and regulators to provide consistent sustainability frameworks are holding back CEOs from focusing their full attention on the long-term issues of sustainability and threatened natural resources. As the report highlights, more urgency is needed:

“As business leaders across the world come together this year to set out an architecture to align business action with global priorities, there is a clear and unequivocal call for greater ambition, greater speed and greater impact.”

– United Nations Global Compact

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Tags: accountability, CEO survey, Climate Change, corporate social reponsibility, corporate social responsibility, CSR, customer research, green marketing, reputation management, responsible brands, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands, United Nations Global Compact
Categories : Climate Change, corporate social responsibility, reputation management, responsible brands, social responsibility, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands

Carbon Trust: 2/3 of public unable to name businesses that take sustainability seriously.

23 09 2013

In a recent survey of more than 1,800 adults in the United Kingdom, The Carbon Trust Fund found that 68% of people were unable to name a company that is taking sustainability seriously.

In addition, just 5% of respondents see businesses as being most effective in helping the environment. Despite the significant efforts many companies across the world are making to turn their business operations to more responsible and sustainable entities, the UK study underscores how poorly those companies are communicating their actions.

According to Tom Delay, the chief executive of Carbon Trust:

“While it’s clear that consumers still care about the environmental future, their perspective on where the responsibility falls is skewed. It cannot be solely down to environmental groups to shoulder the weight of protecting our planet’s natural resources. Businesses have an enormous role to play here and need to be seen to be doing their part. As businesses look for more ways to grow, sustainability should become a golden opportunity for investment, allowing them to become more resilient to future environmental resource shocks and to cut their costs and grow their revenues. The smart companies will invest now and put sustainability inside their businesses.”

The same survey of UK adults did have some encouraging signs regarding concern for the environment. The demand for green products appears to be increasing with only 6% saying they are less likely to buy a sustainable product and/or service than five years ago while almost three in ten (27%) said they are more likely. Increased concern about the personal impact of what they buy on the environment was the most important reason for this (45%) and 43% of the public surveyed said they lead a more sustainable life than five years ago.

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Tags: accountability, branding, cause marketing, Climate Change, customer expectations, customer research, marketing, marketing and communications, reputation management, responsible brands, sustainability, sustainable branding, The Carbon Trust
Categories : Climate Change, corporate social responsibility, lack of trust, reputation management, responsible brands, social responsibility, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands

CDP Report: World’s Largest Companies Doing Little On Climate Change

17 09 2013

“As countries around the world seek economic growth, strong employment and safe environments, corporations have a unique responsibility to deliver that growth in a way that uses natural resources wisely. The opportunity is enormous and it is the only growth worth having.” – Paul Simpson, Chief Executive Officer, CDP

Fifty of the 500 largest listed companies in the world are responsible for nearly three quarters of the group’s 3.6 billion metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions, so finds the CDP Global 500 Climate Change Report 2013 released this week. The carbon emitted by these 50 highest emitting companies, which primarily operate in the energy, materials and utilities sectors, has risen 1.65% to 2.54 billion metric tons over the past four years.

The report is co-written by CDP, formerly known as the Carbon Disclosure Project, and professional services firm PwC. It provides the most authoritative evaluation of corporate progress on climate change.

Inadequate momentum to mitigate climate change is also true of the biggest emitters found in each of the ten sectors covered in the report. Titled Sector insights: what is driving climate change action in the world’s largest companies, the new publication includes industry-specific analysis which shows that the five highest emitting companies from each sector have seen their emissions increase by an average of 2.3% since 2009.

Guardian Sustainable Business offered a biting analysis of the report, concluding companies are making little progress in addressing climate change.

“For all the talk of companies taking the threat of climate change seriously, the latest evidence shows the corporate sector is failing to respond in a meaningful way to the threat of environmental catastrophe,” wrote GSB’s Jo Confino.

Paul Simpson, CEO at CDP says: “Many countries are demonstrating signs of recovery following the global economic downturn. However, clear scientific evidence and increasingly severe weather events are sending strong signals that we must pursue routes to economic prosperity whilst reducing emissions of greenhouse gases. It is imperative that big emitters improve their performance in this regard and governments provide more incentives to make this happen.”

While the biggest emitters present the greatest opportunity for large-scale change, the report identifies opportunities for all Global 500 companies to help build resilience to climate and policy shocks by significantly reducing the amount of carbon dioxide they produce each year. For example, the emissions from nearly half (47%) of the most carbon intensive activities that companies identify across their value chains are yet to be measured. The lack of detailed reporting and information of GHGs from sources related to company activities (Scope 3 emissions), as opposed to those from sources owned or directly controlled by them, may lead companies to underestimate their full carbon impact.

Malcolm Preston, global lead, sustainability and climate change, PwC says: “The report underlines how customers, suppliers, employees, governments and society in general are becoming more demanding of business. It raises questions for some organizations about whether they are focused on sustaining growth in the long term, or just doing enough to recover growth until the next issue arises. With the initial IPCC report only weeks away corporate emissions are still rising. Either business action increases, or the risk is regulation overtakes them.”

Companies that demonstrate a strong commitment to managing their impact on the environment are generating improved financial and environmental results. Analysis of the corporations leading on climate progress, as based on CDP’s acclaimed methodology and including BMW, Nestlé and Cisco Systems, suggests that they generate superior stock performance. Further, the businesses that offer employees monetary incentives related to energy consumption and carbon emissions are 18% more successful at accomplishing reductions.

The CDP Global 500 Climate Change Report 2013 is available to download free. It launches this week at CDP’s annual Global Climate Forum which is broadcast live online. The public disclosures of climate change information from Global 500 companies taking part in CDP this year are also available on the CDP website. Over 4,500 businesses in markets around the world have disclosed through CDP this year. Their data will be disseminated to investors via various channels, such as Bloomberg terminals, where it is downloaded an average of 1 million times every six weeks.

Read the CDP Report here

Adapted from an original article at Sustainable Industries blog here

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Tags: accountability, Carbon Disclosure Project, carbon emissions, CDP, Climate Change, corporate social reponsibility, corporate social responsibility, CSR, global warming, responsible brands, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands
Categories : Climate Change, corporate social responsibility, responsible brands, social responsibility, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands

Made Movement: Buy 5% more American made products for 1 million jobs

20 08 2013

Alex Bogusky, our old friend – reformed advertising creative director turned consumer advocate, has launched a new campaign for the Made Movement challenging Americans to buy 5% more American made products. The result of the Made Movement 5% pledge will yield one million jobs for Americans.

Bogusky has created a video explaining the campaign and asks viewers to share the video with two people. You can watch the Million Jobs Project video here.

According to an article in USA Today, Bogusky says “there’s hippie value now to Made in America. Red, white and blue are the new green.” But he cautions in the video, “Sometimes, even if you think a brand is American, even if there’s an American flag on the package, it might not be made here. You have to pay attention.”

You can read the full article in USA Today here.

USA Today: Ad guru attacks outsourcing, seeks to save jobs

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Tags: accountability, corporate social reponsibility, corporate social responsibility, customer expectations, Made Movement, Million Jobs Project, responsible brands, retail marketing, sustainability
Categories : Climate Change, corporate social responsibility, responsible brands, social responsibility, sustainable brands

Levi’s: 501 WasteLess Jeans Made With Recycled Plastic.

14 05 2013

For 140 years, the Levi’s^® brand has made its 501^® jean with the same care, craftsmanship and attention to detail. To that, they’ve added recycled plastic.

The Levi’s^® 501^® Waste<less™ jean is limited-edition and made exclusively for EKOCYCLE™. That’s the social movement founded by legendary musician and producer will.i.am in partnership with Coca-Cola. The goal of this jean and EKOCYCLE™ is to change the way we think about recycling choices and waste.

Each 501^® Waste<Less™ jean is made with 29% post-consumer recycled content, using an average of eight recycled plastic bottles. This year, you might be wearing one of the plastic bottles you drank from – and recycled – last year.

Levi Strauss isn’t the first clothing manufacturer to create a new product line from recycled plastic. In 1993, Patagonia became the first outdoor clothing manufacturer to create fleece made from post consumer recycled plastic soda bottles, and the company’s support of recycling via their manufacturing continues. According to Patagonia’s website, the company has saved some 86 million soda bottles from the trash heap over the past thirteen years.

Another apparel company who incorporates sustainability throughout their business model is Puma. InCycle is the company’s first 100 percent biodegradable or recyclable clothing, accessory, and footwear collection. Puma’s efforts towards creating InCycle recently earned them Cradle to Cradle Products Innovation Institute’s product certification.

For an update on the Cradle to Cradle progress, check out The Upcycle: Beyond Sustainability – Designing for Abundance, the new best selling book from pioneers William McDonough and Michael Braungart.

When it comes to plastic use and its impact on human health and the environment, the various statistics are nothing short of disturbing: plastic takes up to 1000 years to degrade in a landfill; 92 percent of Americans age six or older test positive for BPA; Americans use 2,500,000 plastic bottles every hour.

Check out this video, which features will.i.am, along with Levi’s® James “JC” Curleigh and Jonathan Kirby.

Read more at the original post at http://www.triplepundit.com/2013/05/levi-strauss-creates-sustainable-jeans/

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Tags: accountability, corporate social reponsibility, corporate social responsibility, CSR, ekocycle, green marketing, Levi's, marketing, recycling, reputation management, responsible brands, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands
Categories : Climate Change, corporate social responsibility, responsible brands, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands

RAIN: Replenish Africa Initiative From Coca-Cola

1 05 2013

Nearly one billion people do not have access to clean, safe water – that’s the equivalent of 1 in 8 people on the planet! In Africa, preventable waterborne illnesses claim the lives of millions of people each year. No single organization can resolve Africa’s water crisis, but together, with a combination of civil society, non-governmental organizations and government, we can make a positive difference on Africa’s water challenges.

The Replenish Africa Initiative, or RAIN, is therefore the signature community initiative of The Coca-Cola Africa Foundation. Backed by a six-year, $30 million dollar commitment by The Coca-Cola Company, in partnership with other donors, RAIN’s goal is to provide over 2 million people in Africa with access to drinking water by 2015. RAIN will launch over 100 water access programs across Africa, including sanitation and hygiene education programs.

The Coca-Cola Africa Foundation has been involved in community water programs since 2005. To date, 42 water projects in 27 countries have been supported, in partnership with and co-funded by USAID (United States Agency for International Development) under the Water and Development Alliance (WADA) and other partners. Within The Coca-Cola Company’s three-tier global water stewardship strategy which is focused on Reducing, Recycling and Replenishing the amount of water used in Coca-Cola beverages and their production, The Coca-Cola Africa Foundation’s focus is on Replenishing – or community based water interventions.

The United Nations estimates that Sub-Saharan Africa alone loses 40 billion hours per year collecting water; that’s the same as a whole year’s worth of labor by France’s entire workforce! This is incredibly valuable time.

According to The Water Project, with much of one’s day already consumed by meeting basic needs, there isn’t time for much else. The hours lost to gathering water are often the difference between time to do a trade and earn a living and not. Just think of all the things you would miss if you had to take three hours out each day to get water.

When a water solution is put into place, sustainable agriculture is possible. Children get back to school instead of collecting dirty water all day, or being sick from waterborne illnesses. Parents find more time to care for their families, expand minimal farming to sustainable levels, and even run small businesses. learn more at http://thewaterproject.org

In collaboration with various partners, volunteers, patrons and organizations, RAIN is not just for the immediate future of Africa, but also for the long-term sustainability of its resources. RAIN is also The Coca-Cola Company’s contribution to help Africa meet the UN Millennium Development Goal on water and sanitation.

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Tags: accountability, cause marketing, Climate Change, Coca-Cola, corporate social reponsibility, corporate social responsibility, CSR, global warming, Replenish Africa Initiative, reputation management, responsible brands, sustainability, sustainable branding, sustainable brands, The Water Project
Categories : Climate Change, corporate social responsibility, responsible brands, sustainable branding, sustainable brands

ourhorizon.org: Climate Change Warnings On Gas Pumps

23 04 2013

Canadian lawyer Robert Shirkey wants all Canadians who pump gasoline to understand the threat of climate change. He has started a campaign, ourhorizon.org that calls for labels to be put on gas pump nozzles. The campaign aims to get municipalities in Canadian provinces to pass legislation that require the labels.

If the name of the campaign sounds familiar, it is a reference to the offshore drilling rig, the Deepwater Horizon that spilled 4.9 million barrels of crude oil into the Gulf of Mexico in 2010. As the campaign states, “Our name is a rejection of the system that made BP’s offshore drilling rig the Deepwater Horizon a reality.” However, the campaign makes it clear that it does “not blame BP,” but takes the position “that we each share in the responsibility for this tragedy.”

There are 4,000 municipalities in Canada. The campaign’s website contains a database of municipal councilors in Canada, and encourages people to send a letter to their local representative, called a councillor, in Canada. The database has “every single municipal councillor’s email in all of Canada.” Through the website, a user can email a letter to their local councillor just by clicking a button.

Here is a screen shot of the ourhorizon.org home page

The campaign is funded through crowdsourcing via a donation page. The donation page asks users to donate in order to help the campaign do two things:

Fund a legal campaign for every province and territory in Canada in order to empower representatives to pass legislation, which carries an estimated $40,000 price tag
Send a postcard to every elected official in Canada with an image of the campaign’s concept and an explanation on the back, which carries an estimated $20,000 price tag

There are a few interesting facts about the campaign, including that it is market-based, as its website stresses. The purpose of the warning labels is to “supply the market with relevant information and let the market do its thing.” The way it will work is that the “label will change some behaviors but, more importantly, they will create a shift in the social environment to facilitate political action on climate change.”

Canadian Environment Under Siege

Many environmentalists and concerned citizens in Canada have been frustrated to watch the unbridled development of Canadian natural resources by the government at the urging of powerful lobby groups. The continued oil industry development of the Alberta Tar Sands and the promotion of the building of the Keystone XL pipeline have alarmed many people concerned about the future direction of the country. Activists such as Idle No More – a group of First Nations members – are protesting the government’s development of natural resources on Crown Land – in violation of treaties between First Nations groups and the Canadian government. According to Wikipedia, The Idle No More movement generally opposes certain types of resource exploitation, particularly on First Nations territory. The movement takes this stance against resource exploitation, as attributed to First Nations sovereignty and environmental sustainability. The position is supported by many groups including non-governmental and grassroots organizations. In a human rights report on Canada, Amnesty International suggested that the government should have “respect for indigenous rights when issuing licences for mining, logging and petroleum and other resource extraction.” Learn more at idlenomore.ca

Warning Labels Work.

The European Union requires the use of climate change warnings in regards to new car sales. In 2008, the EU’s Department of Transport (DfT) issued new guidelines which required all promotional literature for new cars sales to include information about carbon dioxide emissions.

Warning labels with graphic images are proven to raise public awareness. ourhorizon.org compares the warning labels, which contain strong images, to those on “tobacco packages.” In 2001, Canada became the first country to use images in its cigarette warning labels. The use of such warning labels works, according to a 2009 report by the European Commission, Directorate General for Health and Consumers. The report found the following:

Warning labels on cigarette packages “increase consumers’ knowledge about the health consequences of tobacco use and contribute to changing consumer’s attitudes towards tobacco use as well as changing consumers’ behavior”
Warning labels are “a critical element of an effective tobacco control policy”
Warning labels have a high impact in educating consumers about the risks of tobacco use, and a medium impact in changing smokers’ behavior
Fear-induced warnings (using shocking images related to health risks) are the most effective way to educate consumers on the health risks of tobacco use and to change their attitudes and behavior.

Original post at Triple Pundit by Gina-Marie Cheeseman.

http://www.triplepundit.com/2013/04/canadian-lawyer-climate-change-warning-labels-gas-pumps/

Photos by ourhorizon.org

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Tags: accountability, Climate Change, corporate social reponsibility, energy efficiency, gas pump warning labels, global warming, ourhorizon.org, responsible brands, sustainability, sustainable brands
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