Our view
A regulatory obligation costs money. Relevant information makes it. The whole difference lies there.
A starting point
Take a field like event organising: cutting your carbon footprint by giving it up entirely may sound simple. It overlooks what events achieve: economic sustainability, social cohesion, collaboration across an industry.
It also forgets that an event saves travel. Bringing participants together in one place, at one time, spares them a year of journeys.
The point, then, is to keep the value of meeting and exchanging, and to take responsibility for the rest. That path is nothing other than mastering your value chain: informed decisions that make your business more sustainable, more profitable, fairer and less exposed to climate risk.
Our vision
Humanity's survival has always depended on its ability to adapt to its environment. This same ability allows entrepreneurs to seize opportunities, differentiate themselves and grow.
Rather than seeing sustainability as a constraint, it is wiser to treat it as an opportunity: one that lets you align naturally with emerging regulation, without being forced into it at the last minute.
Traditional value chain analysis is becoming obsolete. A ski resort, for instance, depends heavily on winter snowfall. No financial dashboard says so, and yet that is where the risk lies.
The objective goes beyond measurement to the decisions and actions that follow. That is why the approach must be efficient, building on the data you already hold rather than demanding new data.
Sustainability data should be integrated on the same footing as revenue or margin, and analysed with the same rigour, to support sound decision-making.
Your benefits
more profit within three to five years, according to Bob Willard's research.
of the younger generation choose an employer that puts sustainability first.
faster sales growth for sustainable products, according to the Harvard Business Review.
of consumers in the US and UK expect brands to support sustainable living.
Even traditionally polluting industries, such as oil and aviation, are embracing carbon reduction. Wait, and you leave the field to others.
Major investors are gradually withdrawing from polluting industries, as climate and regulatory risks rise.
What actions to take
Six levers. Their effect on your footprint is quantified before you spend a franc.
LED lighting, smart thermostats, energy-efficient equipment. Consumption down by 20 to 30%, depending on the state of your infrastructure.
Cut single-use plastics, compost organic waste, improve sorting. The combined effect is almost always underestimated.
Power your own sites, up to the point where the energy-related footprint disappears altogether.
Public transport, car sharing and electric vehicles, encouraged by tangible incentives. The largest item in most of the footprints we measure.
Favour suppliers and providers with sustainable practices: local materials, low-impact catering, low-emission products.
For the emissions that cannot be avoided, and only as a last resort: offset projects such as reforestation or renewable energy schemes.
In practice
Each of these effects assumes you can show your results to a client, an auditor or an investor, and then answer the question that always follows: where does this figure come from?
