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AA and Innocent kill the ethical consumer
Posted by: David Willans
A strong title I know, but it got your attention.
I've seen two things recently that reinforces Futerra's position that sustainability needs to be mainstream, not ethical niche.
1. An article about American Apparel in Fast Company that shows they found in their comms that sex sells better than ethics.
2. Innocent's continued positioning of putting the health message above the sustainability one.
What do these two things tell us?
People want to be sexy more than ethical. People want to be healthy more than ethical. Sustainable development gives you both sex appeal and health (as well as a healthy dose of ethics too).
In the context of commodity-price inflation, businesses need to be looking after their supply chain, so they can deliver you the best quality product. Only then can you sell sexy, red hot, singlets and delicious drinks packed full of goodness.
My point. Sustainable buiness equals quality, health, sex appeal and ultimately demand. Unsustainable business equals unstable supply chains (oil prices, increasing global demand etc. you don't need to be a rocket scientist), races to the bottom (not a good trend for any industry) and low quality product.
Quality and sex sells. It always has done. The world has changed. Quality and sex can't be made for 20p a day in Vietnam any more. Businesses need to make some serious strategic decisions, then start telling the story. Otherwise someone else will and you will lose out. So put your stake in the ground and make some noise, it's the only way people will hear you through the drone of 'mine is cheaper than yours'.....
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Nice one Dave...totally agreemaybe one day we'll see the notion of being financially 'cheap' being applied to products that are ethically 'cheap' too...