Five Steps Towards Transforming Your Brand’s Sustainability

Given the current global efforts to decrease carbon emissions and reduce waste, there’s no better time to promote your brand’s eco credentials. Unfortunately, the world is drowning in landfill sites. Every year the UK sends 7 million tonnes of waste to landfill. That’s just over 285 Wembley stadiums filled with rubbish!

Take a look at these five steps for building a more sustainable brand and creating a greener footprint for your business.

1 Products people will love

Distributing promotional products is not only good for brand recognition but can also be environmentally friendly: make sure it is a product people will actually want to use and won’t end up as waste.

Creating products that people love to be seen with and actually find practical and beneficial, will ensure that your brand logo is seen by more people as it will be used more often and for much longer. For example:

• durable tote bags
• functional face masks
• handy pens
• pencils
• mugs
• water bottles.

These examples are all perennial favourites.

2 Use recyclable materials

One of the easiest ways to transform your brand’s sustainability is to switch from using virgin to biodegradable materials. As well as making products people will love, make sure these products are made of materials kind to the environment.

Using biodegradable materials will also encourage more people to take home and use your products, as they know your product won’t have a negative impact on the environment. These could include:

• bamboo
• recycled plastic
• Wheatstraw pens
• pencils
• pencil cases made from recycled plastic bottles or tyres.

Be sure to print what the product is recycled from on the object itself, to make the merchandise more appealing, and make it stand out from the other 500 plastic pens and pencils people have at home.

3 Make it ethical

By switching to fair trade and eco-friendly materials, you are making your brand much more attractive through improving the environment: for nature and for the workers that make these products- a win-win. A cotton t-shirt takes up to 3000 gallons of water to make, so why not switch to eco-cotton shirts?

Workers in Vietnam and Cambodia earn just over the equivalent of £4 a day, so why not switch to fair trade companies that pay their workers a proper salary?

4 Educate others on sustainability

Engage others in the effort to create a more sustainable environment through manufacturing environmentally friendly products that people will use instead of the non-recyclable alternatives like plastic bottles and bags. Promote gifts of reusable water bottles and tote bags that people can use for years to come. This shows your brand supports sustainable habits and makes for superb brand awareness.

5 Support local manufacturers

Choosing to buy British is a powerful tag for environmentally conscious brands and helps to reduce impact and carbon emissions by avoiding airfreight. This creates a cleaner environment and reduces your business’ carbon footprint, as well as supporting local manufacturers.

Ready to make sustainability your new mission for 2021?

Get in touch to find out what’s trending in the world of sustainable merch…

At GB Merchandise, we have over 20 years’ experience helping companies just like yours to build your reputation as a community and social champion…

In partnership with our clients, we develop strategies and plans to ensure that we are ‘doing our bit’ for local, regional, national and international communities. Whether it’s sourcing products from local enterprises, providing sponsorship for local teams, or donating products to charitable causes and events.

 GBM recognise the growing concerns around environmental issues. We are at the forefront of the movement by proactively identifying more sustainable products and materials to deliver eco-friendly solutions. This includes:

• Products made from recycled materials.
• Products manufactured using certified sustainable materials and processes.
• Minimising our (and your) carbon footprint by buying local products where possible.

Not only do we supply great branding merchandise and products, we add out-of-the-box thinking, along with innovative ways to package your ideas and get your brand noticed – providing you with that all-important return on your marketing investment.

A full catalogue of our products can be found here.

Call 020 3818 0270, or email info@gbmerchandise.com.
We look forward to hearing from you.

Make sustainability your new mission for 2021!
Saving you money, and saving the planet…