How to Start to Become a More Sustainable Brand
Yetzalee Mazza, marketing director for Jambu & Co., agreed that achieving true product sustainability is a complicated process. “It takes into account … Read source
How to Start to Become a More Sustainable Brand?
So, if you want to become a more sustainable brand, how do you start? What are the first steps?
First of all, it’s important to think about your brand’s sustainability competency.
The first step is to define what being more sustainable means to your brand. This will vary depending on the type of business you run and what you want to achieve. For example, a fast-fashion brand may want to reduce its CO2 emissions from shipping and manufacturing, while a luxury fashion brand may want to limit its use of leather.
Once you have a clear idea of what being sustainable means for your brand, you can identify the most important areas of your business in terms of impact and set goals accordingly. Your sustainability goals should be SMART: specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time-bound.
You should also think about how your goals can be measured and monitored so that you can track your progress over time. The aim is to not only produce short-term results that look good but also set yourself up for long-term sustainability success.
How Do You Measure Your Sustainability Success?
To measure your sustainability success, you’ll need to be able to identify the key metrics that show how your brand is doing against its goals. You’ll also want to start thinking about having ways to track performance over time as well as the ability to benchmark against competitors.
What About Environmental Awareness in Fashion?
One thing we haven’t touched upon yet is environmental awareness within fashion itself. What about all those messages we see on social media: “Don’t buy fast fashion!” or “Don’t buy this product!”?
As a business owner working in fashion, it can be overwhelming when you open your Instagram or Twitter feed and find out that everyone else thinks they know better than you how to run your business. But we have to remember that people care, and they care about the environment and the impact brands are having on the planet. That’s why many consumers are looking for ways to reduce their environmental footprint and they are willing to pay more for sustainable products. In fact, a recent study showed that 52% of consumers would pay more for products from companies doing good in the world. That’s a huge market opportunity if you can deliver.
In addition to looking at how consumers are responding to environmental messaging, it’s important to look at the data and see what your customers are doing. Are they buying less? Are they buying more? What are they buying? What are they not buying?
One of the most important metrics to track is your sales. We think that brands should be tracking their sales and profitability over time and benchmarking against the market as a whole. If you’re not doing that, you’re not going to know what’s really happening in your business.
This is also a good way to find out if you are simply responding to fashion trends. If you see that your sales decline every year, you could be making changes simply because you’re responding to the market.
If you want to be able to reach your sustainability goals and create long-term success, it’s critical to have a solid understanding of your brand’s financial performance and how it compares to the market as a whole.