Brands are wooing consumers with the idea of sustainability, says Vinay Kothari

Brands have been part of the social narrative ever since the advent of the branding industry. Iconic brands become a tool for a target consumer to express their identities i.e. ‘I eat vegan cheese because I care for animals’ or ‘I wear khadi because I appreciate clothes handcrafted by local artisans’, and so on.

One way consumers express their identity is by supporting ideas and causes they believe in and sustainability is one such idea that consumers deeply care about. This is the rather new niche where the brands want to fit in and thrive.

Visit the website of any new age brand and you will find different versions of the statement, ‘We are a sustainable ______ brand’, proudly displayed. You can fill out the blank with a different category like coffee, candy, apparel, shoes, toothpaste and even underwear.

Digging a little deeper, what does sustainability even mean? The term is broader than eco-friendly, organic, fair trade, and so forth. If you visualise this as a venn diagram, then sustainability would encompass all of the above and more.

It essentially means the ability to maintain the status quo, the ability to be up-held, to co-exist. If I have to define it in the context of business, it would be the ability of the environment, society and economy to flourish. To see the environment, society and economy as an interconnected system where the only way to make gains is if all the three components benefit or profit each other.

In my opinion, brands are engaging with sustainability on three levels:

Hygiene: This is the bare minimum expected of a brand using the term ‘sustainable’. Most brands here have a limited understanding of sustainability and restrict their participation to planting trees, biodegradable packaging, and uploading relatable posts on social media.

Advocate: These are a set of brands who understand what sustainability means, they understand that every economic activity has an impact and the idea is not to shut down carbon emissions but to balance it out. 

Brands here try and minimise their impact, some examples could be trying to become carbon-positive, practise waste disposal, and provide fair wages to field-level and ground-level employees.

Pioneers: These are brands that have their business models built around sustainability. Their bottom line is heavily dependent on their actions on sustainability. Finding an alternative to plastic, respecting communities and looking at them as stakeholders, donating a part of their profits to charity, et al. For them, ideas that further the cause of sustainability are not looked at as expenses but considered as investments.

The good news for young brands is that due to the nature and size of business, incumbent brands have to move through these levels, while challenger brands have the option to become pioneers.

(The author is the founder and CEO of GO DESi, a new-age packaged food brand.)