Beyond the budget: How to maximise the potential of your branded merchandise (Part 2)
13/9/2023
This is Part 2 in our ‘Beyond the budget’ series, Part 1 is available here.
How you approach your next branded merchandising project could make or break your company’s image. It might sound dramatic but branded merchandise is a physical representation of your brand’s story, values and ethics. Which, if you get it wrong, can have disastrous unintended consequences.
Patagonia, widely considered the world’s most sustainable company, has come under fire for their lack of commitment to ensure fair wages for the garment workers in their supply chain. Allbirds too – a sustainable and ethical footwear brand and B Corp, narrowly dodged a class action lawsuit after animal welfare violations were discovered in their supply chain, alongside misleading claims about their carbon footprint. An Innocent Smoothies TV commercial was ruled as false advertising by the ASA after it called itself ‘environmentally friendly’, despite using single-use plastic packaging.
In part 2 of our series on promotional products and how to boost their impact, we’ll help you understand the inherent challenges of identifying what makes a product genuinely sustainable and ethical. We’ll dive back into how applying the rule of ‘quality above everything’ will help you navigate these choppy waters with ease. Plus you’ll gain access to our free digital checklist detailing the exact steps you need to take to apply the rule to your next branded merchandise project so you can make the right decision, every time.
Outright greenwashing aside, why is it so hard to identify, measure and communicate the ethical and sustainable elements of products accurately?
Let’s take a look at plastic, as an example.
Despite a plastic bag being made with harmful fossil fuels, taking centuries to break down, and being used on average for just 12 minutes, it still creates a lower environmental toll than paper or cotton.
Reusable bags may eliminate the need for plastic, can biodegrade and be up-cycled, but they can be resource intensive, depending on how and where they’re made. Cotton uses a lot of water, pesticides and toxic chemicals if it isn’t made to organic GOTS standards. According to the UNEP report, tote bags need to be used a minimum of 50 – 150 times to negate their impact. Paper too can only compete if it is made with recycled fibres within a facility that prioritises circular waste management and is powered by renewable resources, and if the bag is composted vs sent to landfill.
The impact of these three materials are driven down by use. Meaning that creating something they will use and educating recipients to ensure they do use the product, is of paramount importance.
So, which would you choose for your next project – paper, plastic or cotton?
In another example, sourcing products locally might mean a lower footprint and higher welfare standards, but could leave thousands of vulnerable people without work – with terrible consequences. Some of which we witnessed during the pandemic when fast fashion companies refused to pay their manufacturers.
Where will you choose to source your items from?
Greenwashing further complicates this issue as manufacturers claim to offer ‘low cost’ and ‘high quality’ products, yet fail to offer transparency in their supply chain or any form of impact measurement. Words like ‘sustainable’, ‘green’, and ‘eco-friendly’ are not regulated, and are used ad-lib. At the present time of writing there is no unified standard that can tell you whether sustainability claims are true. Despite the hammer falling and companies being penalised for deliberately misleading customers, the practice continues.
This is why we use a rigorous 3rd party assessment with all of our brand partners, to ensure we only offer products we can prove are as good as they claim to be – for your peace of mind.
The practicalities of an ethical procurement process can also create barriers. Social Enterprises, despite ticking all the boxes, can struggle to meet the demands of tight deadlines, large orders or last-minute changes. Making switching to new suppliers more risky than leaning on existing relationships.
The nuances within sourcing high-quality, environmentally sound and socially responsible products can prove a real challenge for anyone short on time or cash. Which leads us full circle to why the ‘grab and go’ strategy of traditional merchandising prevails.
But help is at hand.
How To Successfully Apply The Rule Of Quality
So what should you do now?
We know that branded merchandising is at its most effective when purpose-driven and quality-focused. We also know it is hard to define what quality means in a landscape peppered with environmental and social potholes ready to trip you up.
The good news is there is a shortcut.
With services like the one we offer here at Social Supermarket, you can easily discover beautiful merchandise that comes from independent brands with a social mission.
We have created a unique quality control process that ensures all the brand partners we work with meet our high standards – and yours. Once verified, all our brands fit into one or more of our three pillars to deliver a net positive outcome every time:
- Eco Conscious → actively reducing their footprint
- Economic empowerment → employing communities furthest from the workforce
- Charitable contributions → donating profits from every sale to good causes
We’ve spent 5 years curating the largest collection of verified purpose-driven brands and Social Enterprises and put them together under one roof. Helping to ensure that for every £1 you spend your positive impact is both magnified and measurable – creating a real ripple of change.
By working with these brands we’re able to fund incredible projects worldwide, contribute to charitable causes and support groundbreaking climate initiatives. Find out more about the impact brands like yours have already had, by browsing our Impact Report here.
Our invitation to you
Traditional merchandising is an incredible brand-building strategy you cannot afford to overlook. But the historical approach of ‘more is better’ or ‘bottom-line only’ decision-making is no longer fit for purpose. Nor is it what your audience wants.
Your buying decisions do matter, and will come under increasing scrutiny from your customers and employees in the years to come. The good news is that the knowledge and support exists today to help you make an informed choice, whatever that may be, so you can stand by your decision with confidence and pride.
We invite you to use your next branded merchandising project as an opportunity to fuel the change both within the industry itself and beyond. Experience first-hand the benefits of using high-quality products that create a positive global impact, to keep your brand front and centre for all the right reasons.
p.s. Don’t just take our word for it…
“We wanted to gift all our employees […] Social Supermarket suggested plants which were ethically sourced and had a positive social impact […] We’ve received fantastic feedback and I look forward to continuing to work with Social Supermarket.” – Slalom
To learn more about how we can quickly help you source and personalise the very best branded merchandise from ethical and sustainable brands, send us a message here.
