The Global Climate Strike kicked off with some impact. With the climate change debate fully mainstream, some businesses are recognising their potential to positively effect change. This can take many different guises, but one trend we are seeing is the rise in brand and corporate activism.
For today’s Global Climate Strikes, some businesses have taken the opportunity to lend their weight and support their customer and employee passions.
Ben & Jerry’s, Patagonia, Lush and SodaStream all closed their doors to encourage employees to participate. Meanwhile though Amazon faced employee backlash in an historic walk out in protest of perceived climate inaction. This occurred even after the retailer renewed commitments around carbon reduction.
We live in a world where consumers and employees engage more with companies that share their values. Research we conducted showed that 80% of people are more likely to buy from a brand that ‘does good’ with 52% willing to pay a premium for that assurance. This number rises to almost two thirds amongst millennials which is having a direct impact on commercial success.
What’s been interesting about the Global Climate Strikes is that it’s encouraging even more scrutiny from employees – are you the type of business who can help our cause or are you part of the problem that we need to strike against. If momentum for this movement keeps up, and it’s hard to imagine that it won’t, businesses need to think about which camp they’re going to be in next year.