The demand for sustainability-first brands has increased, and is set to continue. The media is awash with stats about the exponential growth of sustainability-first brands, relative to the market average, and the investment community is ‘all-in.
As a budget-holder, how do you decide on what sustainability issues to back? You need to be sure that you’re spending money where you can have maximum impact. How do you predict and act on sustainability demand?
Sustainability demand is created by the intersection of ESG needs, culture, business and brand objectives. When we’re predicting sustainability demand, we create a Sustainability Demand Matrix which incorporates the following:
- Material Impact – the sustainability issue to be addressed within environmental, social and governance to reduce risk and be attractive to the investor community
- Investor Momentum – understanding investors’ priorities past and present as a signifier of what will drive corporate agendas
- Consumer Sentiment – what’s happening now and what do we expect to happen next?
- Culture – what’s the broader landscape within which trends are manifesting?
- Business agendas – what are the targets that the business has set? What are the capabilities of the business to reach these targets?
Using our matrix, we find the sweet spot between consumer, commercial and sustainability agendas. It’s through finding this sweet spot that we deliver brand growth, market value and better sustainability outcomes.
Read our post tomorrow to explore sustainability demand through the lens of plant-based foods.