con·sump·tion [kuh n-suhmp-shuh n] –noun
1. the act of consuming, as by use, decay, or destruction.
2. the amount consumed: the high consumption of gasoline.
3. Economics. the using up of goods and services having an exchangeable value.
4. Pathology.
a. Older Use. tuberculosis of the lungs.
b. progressive wasting of the body.
Can’t live with it. Can’t live without it (archaic pathologies excepted). But we can live with less of it. At least so says Unilever, Tesco, Heinz and a whole cadre of revered CPG companies that just signed on to the UK Government’s product impact redux initiative. (Find the whole story here.) Working through the government-funded Waste and Resources Action Programme (WRAP), participating companies will analyze product lifecycles with the goal of using resources more sustainably during three key phases of the supply chain: packaging, household food and waste, and product and packaging waste.
Aggregate aims of the initiative include the reduction of all grocery packaging by 10% through light-weighting and recycling and a 5% decrease in all product and packaging waste (with 2009 as baseline year and 2012 as deadline).
Tesco’s efforts include converting store-brand liquor bottles from glass to plastic and using lightweight glass for wine bottles. (We only hope that the lightweight can still hold its alcohol.) As an aside, Tesco will have to do much more to edge out Marks & Spencer, not a participant in this initiative but a company that has pledged to become the world’s most sustainable national retailer by 2015. (More on that here.) WRAP, meanwhile, is no stranger to big sustainability efforts in its own right: Its creds include a consumer-facing household food waste campaign called ‘Love food hate waste' (2009) which exhorts UK consumers to help reduce the staggering £10bn worth of food that’s thrown out every year. Even beyond the emotive power of tearful fruit, entrenched recession should help the cause. (Long live my Depression-weaned grandmother’s frugal sensibilities. No edible remains were ever too humble for the next night’s casserole.)
Marketers take note: consumption is no longer an implicitly expected perpetuity. It’s quick becoming a disposable phenomena. (Appropriate, eh?) Forget the supplications of those retrograde anticonsumerists (don’t ask me to name names); the opponents of the indulgent (or perhaps just over-packaged) now include government – which tends to wield sticks more adeptly than carrots. What’s it mean for brands? It’s time to figure out a way to thrive in a world where consumption-driven growth is non grata. That won’t necessarily mean conforming to a Patagonia model of willful production redux, but it may very well mean finding new ways to build value – ways that depend on more than volume of units sold. Or, better still, it will mean redoubling efforts to reach that sustainability be-all and end-all: absolute impact neutrality.
When your brand does – or rather when it contemplates that first step – we’ll be here to help you plan it and talk about it.
