The times they are a changing: How

I want to take you back to 1993. A bright-eyed and optimistic me was just starting the first big job I had. I was working at Bradford Council within the Economic Development Team as an Environmental Business Support Officer. I had a really forward-thinking boss (hat-tip Dai Larner) who saw an opportunity to access EU Structural Funds (oh those were the days) to support local manufacturers to reduce their environmental impact and increase their business and profitability. This was a novel approach, no-one was really doing this at the time. Free environmental support for small and medium sized enterprises. Bradford was the wool textile capital of the world at one point, with an estimated two-thirds of the World’s wool being processed there. The city was an industrial one, rich in coal and iron ore and increasingly polluted. There’s a longer story of industrial success and decline but thats for another day. When I moved to the city in 1988 it was in deep industrial and economic decline but it still had a greater proportion of textile producers than any other UK city and a high proportion of printing companies (both sector were heavily polluting). Along with the fat refinery in the city centre, a chemical company or two and the remains of heavy industry and numerous foundries it had significant environmental challenges. But there were also the beginnings of a renaissance with companies like Pace, Chase, Filtronic, Microvitech and Morrisons Supermarkets growing fast. Add into that the entrepreneurial Pakistani and Bangladeshi-owned businesses and it was a genuinely exciting place to be.

So my job? I had to run the green business club (this grew to in excess of 600 members and was lauded by the now King Charles as a great model), and to visit and support 50 SMEs a year. I did 200. It was the best apprenticeship ever. I’d go out to companies talk to them about sustainability. The big challenge was finding a connection, some common ground. I’m quite good at that (remember, people buy people) and once that was done I’d ask them how I could help.

The normal question I’d be asked was:

‘Mark, can you help keep me lean?’

Yep, of course I can. Sustainability mainly reduces costs.

Investing in efficient and lean processes that embrace recyclate as a cheaper feedstock, using efficient machinery that may cost more but will pay back in the medium term, removing waste, re-using resources, getting more product or utility from the same resources and time are all environmentally sensible and will all increase profitability.

My mantra is: “If sustainability is costing you money then you’re doing it wrong”.

I appreciate that there are step-change investments such as new packaging or capital equipment investments, but the payback should be fast. I’ve saved my clients in excess of £160 million, annually, through sustainability initiatives.

Yes, I wish I was on a percentage payment too.

Sometimes this first question was replaced with……

“Mark, can you keep me out pf prison?”

That one was trickier to answer as it depended what they were doing. Illegal waste fires and throwing of used and dirty solvent into the streams were not uncommon. The printing industry was still using solvent-based inks and often had a “rag/wipe service”. This was laundering service for printers rags that would be delivered in huge plastic bags. It was not uncommon for any waste solvent to be tipped back into a bag of used wipes and sent to the laundering service. It was way cheaper than legal disposal. I know, me too. It was battle to change perceptions sometimes.

We then saw the disciplines of brand and reputation management becoming more important. Today many companies’ brand assets are worth more than their physical assets. But back in the 1990s this was an emerging area. Brands were protected by keeping them out of the press. Stop bad news rather than grow good news. Hence the next question I was asked a lot was…

“Mark, can you keep me out of the papers?”

Yep, I can. The first step is to not break any laws (see above), then to cause no nuisance.

I’ve a story here. I worked with a company who made fish food. Fish food is made from dead fish. It is mixed with other materials and then cooked in very thin sheets.

It’s a very odorous process and the factory had a tall chimney with the relevant ‘scrubbers’ (technologies to remove smells and other pollutants). But although the technology removed any issues regarding environmental consents it wasn’t sufficient to remove all the odours and there were many complaints. To counter this the company paid an employee to drive around the area after his shift inside the factory. His task was to sniff the air and identify whether or not there was a smell issue. The problem was that he was completely desensitised to the smell of fish food having worked in the factory for eight hours a day for 20 years.

We solved the problem by upgrading the technology and then pulling together a team of local residents who would “mark” the odour at certain times of the day with a score out of 10 and then call in the number. This allowed the company to understand their nuisance impact and to cross-reference it with weather conditions, the type of product being made that day and the production schedule.

We then moved into an era of risk adversity and control.

This is a good thing but led to the question…

“Mark, can you keep me risk-free?’

Now, the answer here is ‘yes, I can help’. Understanding your risks extends beyond compliance with the law. The fundamental area of concern here is potential risk to the environment, and this splits into risk to land, air, water and in-use risks. But it’s more than that; it embraces supply-chain risks (inability to supply), resource scarcity, waste treatment risks, consumer demand risks (from an environment perspective) and distribution risks (price and availability of fuel for example). Sustainability is only one element of this but it is an increasingly important element.

Having an effective risk register (I cover this in detail in my book “You Can’t Make Money From a Dead Planet”) is essential. Adding to this to a raft of legislation termed the Producer Responsibility Obligations arrived and this meant that buying from a compliant supply chain rather than just a cheap supply chain gave rise to the question…

“Mark, can you keep me supply-chain compliant?”

The End of Life Vehicles legislation, the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment Directive, The Restriction of Hazardous Substances Directive and the Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation and Restriction of Chemicals Directive in the UK all brought attention to the need for supply chain transparency and security in terms of compliance. The need to establish reliable supply chain information and records was a shock to many industries.

As a brand you are only as compliant as your most risky supplier. After leaving the Council I worked first at Asda as Environmental Manager and then setup my own consultancy and we built toolkits for supply-chain compliance, these are complex things.

Then the age of “brand” hit full stride and the need to impress upon your customers that you cared became really important. This lead to a rash of greenwashing. The question became…

“Mark, can you keep me looking good?”

Now, this was the wrong question.

The correct question should have been:

“Mark, can you help us tell our environmental story better?”

Yes, of course. It starts with having a suite of actions.

There is a well-used phrase in marketing (and I’ve seen many friends fall foul of this one): ‘never let the truth get in the way of a good story’. But good stories need the truth running through them like the word ‘BLACKPOOL’ runs through a stick of seaside rock. The consumer has changed massively and I also cover this in detail in the book but suffice to say at this stage that you must let truth get in the way of the story, actually you need to build the story on truth. For too long many people saw marketing and branding as just persuasive lying.

Those days are gone.

Then as the business world woke up to sustainability and it became a rush for the top the noise has grown and grown.

Everyone was doing something, everyone was shouting about their B-Corp status or their altruism, or being plastic-free. In a noisy world maybe the quiet ones garner the most attention.

So the question became…

“Mark, can you keep me ahead of my competitors?”

This is a fascinating question. The answer depends on why you want to stay ahead. Marketing noise? Believability? Trust? Reliability? Still here in 20 years?

I can help with most of those. I say this phrase a lot \

“Kindness is a competitive advantage”

And I believe it.

Being kind is not a weakness, it is a strength.

Treat your supply chain, your team and your customers well, treat the environment well, be cooperative with your competitors, be kind to your neighbours. That is how you stay relevant, attract and retain the best talent in the world, and continue to grow.

Moving on naturally from this came the question…

“Mark, can you keep me relevant to my customers?”

This is the current question that I get asked. The truth here is that the way we understand the customer or the consumer is changing. We used to talk about age or gender, or education as a way of categorising the consumer and therefore as a way of understanding their wants and needs and consequently targeting an offer. The customer is now more informed (mostly), more opinionated and more motivated by their core beliefs.

So what’s changed in the last 30 years? Everything and nothing. Every company is now actively doing something, is actively engaged in some way. That’s good. But, theres way too much hot air. Do something good, do it well with no harm, sell it to those who need it and whose lives will get better as a result, don’t tell lies, do it efficiently. Simple eh?

My book “You Can’t Make Money From a Dead Planet” (Kogan Page) takes you from zero to net-zero and onwards to regenerative business. Available at all good and bad bookshops.

https://www.koganpage.com/responsible-business/you-can-t-make-money-from-a-dead-planet-9781398612020

www.thisisape.co.uk