🌱 How to turn Black Friday blue
Featuring Finisterre, SME Climate Hub, Dr Will's, Impossible Foods and more...
Happy Friday!
Today is Black Friday, so we’re looking at a brand asking you to focus on donations rather than discounts. We’re also opening anonymous nominations for your favourite brand initiative in 2021. Seen a cool campaign, a powerful project, or simply something you’ve loved from a consumer goods brand this year? Let us know.
This week we cover:
Finisterre want to turn Black Friday blue.
SME Climate Hub just launched ‘Climate Fit’ training - we break it down.
In case you missed it: Meet the Partners: Good Business, featuring Sarah Howden, Senior Consultant
> Good News This Week
🎯 Dr Wills is partnering with City Harvest to run a ‘Black & Give Back Friday’, pledging to make a donation for every order placed.
⭐️ Impossible Foods has raised $500 million in funding. The round was led by Mirae. In total, Impossible Foods has raised more than $2 billion since its founding in 2011.
⭐️ John Lewis is targeting ‘throwaway’ culture with a £1 million ideas fund. The Circular Future Fund is focused on food, textiles and household products.
⭐️ Co-op has pledged £11 million over the next 3 years in grants to organisations innovating in low carbon food and farming. This month it is launching a £3m Carbon Innovation Fund, in partnership with its charity Co-op Foundation.
⭐️ The Global Self-Care Federation (GSCF) today announced it has launched the Charter for Environmentally Sustainable Self-Care, a framework to help the sector reduce the environmental impact of self-care products, while ensuring positive health outcomes, consumer safety, and access to effective treatment. Members of the group that have made commitments under the charter include GSK, P&G, and Johnson & Johnson.
⚡️ £11 million in government funding has been announced to help make UK alcohol industry more sustainable. Four projects will receive the funding, to help them transition to Hydrogen and biogas
⚡️ CDP has launched an SME Climate Disclosure Framework, designed to help small and medium-sized firms around the world track progress against science-based climate goals. This has been developed in collaboration with SMEClimateHub.
> Click on each link to read more.
> Brand Spotlight
Turning Black Friday Blue with Finisterre
Finisterre wants you to swap your Black Friday discounts for ‘donations that make a difference’. Encouraging customers to consider passing up the opportunity to buy products they might not need at the temptation of a lower price, Finisterre wants you to pass on a positive impact to their Finisterre Foundation Wetsuit Project instead. For every order received by Finisterre from Friday 26th and Monday 29th November, they’ll donate £2.50.
What is the Finisterre Foundation Wetsuit Project?
Created to alter wetsuits for individuals facing barriers in access to the sea, they work with Bodyline to adapt wetsuits, from any brand. Connection to nature isn’t the first thing that comes to mind this Black Friday, unless you’re Finisterre.
Why is this so important to Finisterre?
Founded in 2003, they’re deeply connected to nature. Their founding philosophy has three pillars: People, Environment and Product. Achieving B Corp certification in 2018, they focus heavily on being a zero waste brand. Their Leave No Trace water soluble packaging in partnership with Aquapak took a year to develop, and they’re planning to open source it to other brands (find out more here). Across their brand and products, they have a commitment to circularity. Via their Lived & Loved initiative, customers can book repairs, trade in their items (in partnership with Reskinned), and learn how to care and repair products properly themselves. Since its launch 10 years ago, the life of 6000 items has been extended. Their Fabric Use Up Project launched in 2015, and they focus heavily on natural fibres across all of their fabrics - an incredible 98% of their cotton is certified organic! Additionally, this year they reached an incredible achievement - 100% of their Nylon and Polyester is now recycled.
A brand committed to being conscious about their impact, they’re transparent and bold with their goals. You can read their full Positive Impact Report to learn more about the work Finisterre are doing behind the scenes.
Check out Finisterre’s website:
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> Quick Take
SME Climate Hub’s ‘Climate Fit’ Training
80% of a consumer goods company’s emissions typically come from its supply chain. Engaging suppliers to decarbonise and reduce their environmental impact is a core part of every brand’s mission to reduce their own impact. Companies should aim to reduce their Scope 3 emissions, but challenges around data and engagement persist - especially for small businesses.
SME Climate Hub, Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership (CISL) and Business for Social Responsibility (BSR) have collaborated on the development of Climate Fit - free net zero training to support SME suppliers. The SME Climate Hub helps brands in three ways:
Commit: SMEs are encouraged to cut emissions in half by 2030, achieve net zero by 2050, and disclose progress on a yearly basis. In doing so, they’ll join the Race to Zero campaign.
Take Action: It provides ‘best in class’ resources and tools designed to help SMEs. Tools can be browsed before brands commit.
Access Support: Working with businesses and financial partners, the hub offers support to SMEs throughout their journey.
SMEs commit to the SME Climate Hub commitments, in order to access the training put together by CISL and BSR. It’s a voluntary course that currently offers no certificate of completion. It was piloted by 30 SMEs from August - September.
What does the training involve?
Climate Fit consists of 7 modules to help SMEs determine how to take climate action and future proof their business. Each has a separate topic, is 20-30 minutes long, and is self paced. Throughout, there are activities and quizzes to encourage engagement.
The topics covered:
Climate strategy and governance
Climate action for your operations
Reducing emissions in your supply chains
Design for net zero
Financing a net zero transition
Engaging your people and your communities in your climate actions
Telling your net zero story
SMEs can engage their suppliers by inviting them to an information session on 15th December (click here to register). There are also resources like email templates on offer in the SMEClimateHub to help.
> In case you missed it
🤝#1 - Meet the Partners: Good Business
Featuring Sarah Howden, Senior Consultant.
