Building Citizen Brands

February 17, 2022
citizen brands, Citizen Good, sustainability, sustainability impact

 

 

Consumers are voting with their wallets. The 2020 Sustainable Market Share Index™  finds that sustainability-marketed products are responsible for more than half of the growth in FMCG. It’s not slowing down despite the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

We refer to them as ‘Citizen Brands’. What are their common traits?

 

  • It is dynamic and creates memorable moments of truth with citizens.
  • It anticipates the needs of citizens through meaningful innovation.
  • It responds to Sustainable Development Goals by driving category transformation.
  • It is generous and shares business practices openly. Nobody wins unless everybody wins.
  • It delivers sustainable and profitable impact.

 

Here are some manifestations of Citizen Brands in a few ways:

 

COMMUNITIES FIRST

  • Happy Family Organics is a premium organic food brand for babies & children. Since 2018, they have been advocating for the inclusion of organic baby food through WIC’s (women, infants and children) program to support low-income families. Their products are now available to roughly 64% of families in the WIC program.
  • My Baby an Indonesian baby care brand launched Momversity to help promote self-learning on parenting. It offers a series of activities such as webinars, competitions, and collaborations with parenting platforms to provide advice from family psychologists to financial planners to empower and educate parents.
  • Mastercard – Across emerging markets, small-scale traders (kiosks) and their wholesalers are caught in a cycle of cash use and informal business operations. Kionect is a supply chain platform that links micro-retailers, wholesalers, and it supports market growth through data and tailored digital financial services.

 

DEMOCRATISING ASSETS

  • Tony’s Chocolonely’s Open Chain is an industry-led initiative that helps chocolate brands transform their cocoa supply chains into sustainable solutions.
  • Ørsted the Dutch energy company shared a handbook that points to key actions that governments and businesses must take now to build a sustainable planet for future generations
  • MUD Jeans offers education with a sustainable fashion course and free webinars eg What running a circular business is really like. Fuckups and lessons learned”.  to inspire others to follow their journey of circularity

 

IMPARTING MASTERY

  • Microsoft created a Content Library for autonomous learning on Inclusion regardless of background or experience.
  • NatWest launched Climate Savers Top Trumps ahead of COP26 to engage teachers and primary aged children with the climate change agenda. Providing inspiration and a platform and encouragement through prizes and visibility to participate. they partnered with Top Trumps, one of Britain’s best-known childhood games.


As Paul Polman former CEO of Unilever said, “It’s not good enough anymore to do CSR….which is basically dealing with the less bad. We need to show that you have a positive impact in this world by being around. If you can’t really show that, why should the citizens of this world keep you around in the first place? “