Marketing for Net Zero

Week 2: The Circular Economy and

Marketing Practice, Part 1
• Dr Pauline Ferguson
• pauline.ferguson@ed.ac.uk
Course structure

Section Week Week’s Topic Workshops

I. Context & theoretical Course introduction

W1
foundations Marketing in the climate crisis & Framing sustainable marketing

W2 Circular Economy and Marketing Practice Part 1 Podcasting Workshop

II. Contemporary marketing
practices, questions, and Circular Economy and Marketing Practice Part 2
W3 Assignment Q&A
challenges in the context of Guest Speaker
climate change
W4 Sustainable Consumption and Marketing Communications

III. The future of Sustainability

W5 The future of sustainable marketing practice
Marketing Practice

image by gratuit
News of the Week

What’s new in the world of marketing for net zero? Share with the class up-to-date developments
and trends in the marketing industry’s efforts to become more sustainable.

Marketing Week Business Green

The Drum Sustainability Magazine

Campaign The Guardian

Planet-warming carbon dioxide levels rose more than ever in 2024 - BBC News
Guest Speaker Next Week: Simon Farrell - Please
Prepare Questions!

Simon Farrell | B Leaders

Simon Farrell - Edinburgh, Scotland, United Kingdom | Professional Profile | LinkedIn

Home - B Leaders
Additional Slide: B Corp

• Brands are increasingly levelling up their sustainable marketing strategies, and

[employing]… a recognisable symbol that consumers can recognise to aid their
buying decisions. Part of this is leading…towards certifications, such as acquiring a
B Corp certification. (Chartered Institute of Marketing, 2022) About B Lab UK - B Lab UK
(bcorporation.uk)
• The B Corp Community is a global movement of businesses that provide leadership
by demonstrating their commitment to people and the planet.

• Certified B Corporations, or B Corps, are companies verified by B Lab to meet high

standards of social and environmental performance, transparency and
accountability.

About B Lab UK - B Lab UK (bcorporation.uk)

What is a B Corp? - B Lab UK (bcorporation.uk)

Marketing and your digital carbon footprint: Where to begin | CIM Content hub

Lily's Kitchen | Lily's Kitchen (lilyskitchen.co.uk)

Additional Slide: B Corp
Intentions:

1.Drive the adoption of our standards

2.Certify and engage businesses to improve their impact

3.Articulate and amplify stories of business as an equitable force for good

4.Catalyse policy change to enable business as a force for good

5.Develop a network of local, regional, and global communities for change. Theory of
Change - B Lab UK (bcorporation.uk)

•Key motivations can be to ‘improve…external reputation with investors, clients and

consumers (Villela et al, 2019: 343)
•Brands – (Virtue) Signalling?
•Risk of Participation?
•Important Network to transition towards sustainable industry / marketing practice.

About B Lab UK - B
Lab UK
(bcorporation.uk)
Today’s Session Aims

•Circular Economy and Marketing Practice Part 1

• To introduce and contextualize Marketers as potential change agents.

• Solutions: introducing the importance of design towards achieving sustainability.
• To introduce the Circular Economy (CE) and circular business models.
Key Readings / Resources for Week 2

Bocken, N.M., De Pauw, I., Bakker, C. and Van Der Grinten, B., 2016. Product design and business
model strategies for a circular economy. Journal of industrial and production engineering, 33(5),
pp.308-320 (essential).

Martin & Schouten (2014)

Chapter 9: Sustainable Products and Services (recommended)

Emery (2012) Sustainable Marketing

Chapter 6: Reconciling Product Sustainability (further reading)

Further resources:

The Butterfly Diagram: Visualising the Circular Economy (ellenmacarthurfoundation.org)

(recommended)
Ellen MacArthur on the basics of the circular economy (youtube.com) (recommended)
How to Build a Circular Economy | Ellen MacArthur Foundation (recommended).
Sustainability Issues and Actors

© 2012 John Wiley & Sons Ltd. www.wiley.com/college/belz

Marketing as Change Agents!

Marketing can influence consumers and the marketing environment beyond ‘the
micro’ eg: connecting consumers to products and brands.

Beyond Marketing as ‘passive’

Marketing can have an impact on the world around it (including for better or worse!)

Macro Marketing

Sustainability Change Agents!

Journal overview and metrics: Journal of Macromarketing: Sage Journals

(Belz and Peattie, 2012:279)

NEWS / SHARES

What examples do you have of marketing / marketers acting as ‘change agent(s)’?

Any barriers to this?

What are some of the brands that you admire in terms of environmental sustainability
practice, and why?
What are some of the brands that you dislike in terms of environmental sustainability
practice, and why?
Do those likes or dislikes translate into any particular responses from you as a
consumer? (i.e you avoid the brand etc).
Sustainability Marketing Transformations

Outside – In Approach – Reactive – seeks to prevent, or delay the changes taking

place. Defends existing practices and models.
Inside –Out Approach – Proactive. Tries to enhance and enlarge the ongoing
processes towards sustainability. Companies and their representatives can act as
sustainability change agents themselves and engage in collaborative efforts towards
sustainable development.
(Belz and Peattie, 2012: 279)
Change Agents?
Types of Outlaws Compliers Case-Makers Innovators Trailblazers
Organisation

State of Play Yet to meet Minimalist Sustainable Extend the Create new
prevailing approach – limited Development business case into models for
legislation to regulatory contributing to new territory business and
compliance commercial economic
success development

Social and Lowest Low Medium High Very High

Environmental
Benefit
Sustainability No – (partly) No – just No – just market Yes – market Yes – political and
Marketing resistant regulation fit fit development public
Transformation development

American Sustainable Business Network - ASBN

Adapted from Belz and Peattie, 2012

‘A journey of 1000 miles begins with one step’ – Ray Anderson, Interface.
Ray Anderson: The business logic of sustainability | TED Talk

By focusing on progress and not perfection and by making better choices, we embrace the
chance to reconsider our craft in hope that it forms a ground swell of change." — John Hoke,
Chief Design Officer Nike Nike Circular Design Guide
The Study of Sustainability Marketing
Auxiliary Sustainability Marketing (ASM) which focusses on the production of
sustainable products. EG reducing planned obsolescence, environmental
improvements throughout marketing mix.
Reformative Sustainability Marketing (RSM) which extends the auxiliary approach
through the promotion of sustainable lifestyles and behavioural changes. EG - Non-
ownership, leasing, renting, sharing.
Transformative sustainable marketing (TSM) which further extends the auxiliary and
reformative approaches through the need for transformation of current institutions
and norms, and critical reflection. EG – Positive Collective Citizen Action, Consumer
Culture.
(Kemper and Ballantine, 2019:277)
Organisational Goals

Triple Bottom Line. Economic, Ecological and Social.

Economic: Sales, Profits, Return on Investment, Taxes Paid, Monetary Flows, Jobs Created
Social: Labour practices, Health and injuries, Community impacts, Human rights and product safety
Environmental: Air and water quality, Energy usage, Waste produced
(Martin and Schouten, 2014)

Carbon Negative Carpet Tile: CQuest & CQuest BioX by Interface

Nike - Protecting the Planet — NIKE, Inc.
Discussion

Are you aware of environmental company goals as a consumer?

Are these important to you?
Why else might these be important? To whom?
Mandatory GHG reporting in UK - Scopes
3 categories of emissions;
•Scope 1 emissions— This one covers the Green House Gas (GHG) emissions that a
company makes directly — for example while running its boilers and vehicles.
•Scope 2 emissions — These are the emissions it makes indirectly – like when the
electricity or energy it buys for heating and cooling buildings, is being produced on its
behalf.
•Scope 3 emissions — Now here’s where it gets tricky. In this category go all the
emissions associated, not with the company itself, but that the organisation is indirectly
responsible for, up and down its value chain. For example, from buying products from its
suppliers, and from its products when customers use them. Emissions-wise, Scope 3 is
nearly always the big one.
•What are scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions? | Deloitte UK

Strategy and goals - Climate

action | Unilever
Design

When customers seek to satisfy a need, the solution may be provided by material
products or immaterial services. Sustainable products and services offer solutions to
customer problems as well as to socio-ecological problems.

We define sustainable products and services as offerings that satisfy customer needs
and significantly improve the social and environmental performance along the whole
life-cycle in comparison to conventional competing offers (Belz and Peattie, 2012:
176)
Discussion

Are there any problems with existing product design approaches in Marketing?
What is the nature of these problems, and potential consequences?
Problematising (some) existing approaches.

Take – make – waste model.

Planned obsolescence…. [to] deliberately shorten a products life span. Built-In, Psychological and
Are disposable
Technological. vapes bad for the
environment? |
Repair can often be difficult to access. Greenpeace UK

Products designed in a way which makes recycling challenging / impossible (clothing blends,
treatments on wood).
‘Disposable’ or Short Life Products (EG - Razors, Fast Fashion)
Health and Safety Concerns – Toxins.
Outcomes and Impacts: Emissions, Raw Material Depletion (finite!) Soil Degradation, Deforestation,
Illness, Poverty, Food insecurity, Polluted oceans.
Packaging
Major source of waste. (more plastic than fish in the ocean by 2050*)
Highly visible to the consumer, and increased concerns about waste (Emery, 2012).
Importance of Packaging: Protecting grouping and loading the product for
transport, stacking and displaying the product, consumer viewing and handling in
store, consumer transport home. Health and hygiene - safe storage at home.
Communication of the Brand.
Communicating information, including sustainability information (ingredients,
production and farming methods, product materials, packaging materials, disposal Home Page | Forest
Stewardship Council
information). UK (fsc.org)

*How does plastic end up in the ocean? | Greenpeace UK

Perfumes for Him & Her Jean Paul Gaultier | Official
Site
Packaging
Packaging can be designed to maximise efficiency whilst minimising its impact on the
manufacturer, retailer, consumer and environment (Emery, 2012).
Elimination – is all packaging used necessary? Is there an unnecessarily inner
packaging? Can packaging contribute to eliminating post-consumer product waste
through packaging to extend shelf life, improved on pack consumer communication.
Reduce – is weight reduction a viable option? Can product volume be reduced –
concentrated liquid detergents? Is best in class packaging being used? Is packaging
being used to give the consumer a false impression of size or amount of product? Can
information be printed on the inside of packaging to allow for smaller packaging?
Reuse –Can packaging be reused by the consumer? Refill strategy from the producer
for example?
Recycle - can a single material be used for ease of recycling? Can different
materials be easily separated for recycling?

(Emery, 2012)

Refill - A - Bottle 450ml |

(cifclean.co.uk) Reusable Bottle | Faith In
Nature
Life-cycle orientation

Life-cycle orientation – sustainable products have to consider the whole life-cycle

from cradle to grave: extraction of raw materials, transportation, manufacturing,
distribution, use, and post use.
(Belz and Peattie, 2012:176)

Life-Cycle Assessment (LCA)

Life cycle assessment (LCA) is a standardised…and science-based methodology for
assessing the impacts associated with the life cycle of a product or service, which can
help understand the environmental implications.
(Pena et al, 2021:216)
The way in which products are designed and produced determines to a large extent
how much energy, water and natural resources we use, and how much we waste.
The design and planning of products is therefore become central to achieving
sustainability. It is not only that consumers need to be more sustainable; they also
have to have sustainable product choices made available to them.
(Emery, 2012:160)
Cradle-to-Cradle Approach
Cradle-to-Grave Strategy since the Industrial Revolution.
[we have] set up a system which mined and cut down valuable natural resources,
many irreplaceable, to produce products that…eventually end up in landfill – literally
burying any value those resources might retain… (Emery, 2012:165)

Cradle-to-cradle design provides a practical design framework for creating

products… in a positive relationship with ecological health and
abundance…(Braungart et al, 2007:1)

Braungart and McDonough propose that products should be designed from the start
so that, after their useful lives, they will provide useful material for future generations of
products, or biodegrade naturally and safely to restore the soil. Essentially, the
product or its component materials travel full circle to become another product or
fuel for the natural environment (Emery, 2012:165)
Do you recognise this person?

The surprising thing I learned sailing solo around

the world | Dame Ellen MacArthur

On this day in 2005: Dame Ellen MacArthur breaks

round-the-world record (bt.com)(bt.com)
What is the circular economy?

• The circular economy tackles climate change and other global challenges, like
biodiversity loss, waste, and pollution, by decoupling economic activity from the
consumption of finite resources. What is a circular economy? | Ellen MacArthur
Foundation
• Significant and growing interest from governments, investors and businesses (Pieroni,
2019)
• Enhanced sustainability or circularity requires changes in the way companies
generate value, understand and do business (Pieroni et al, 2019:199)
• Rethinking the Design of Products and Business Models.
What is the Circular Economy?
Three principles, driven by design:
Eliminate waste and pollution
The first principle of the circular economy is to eliminate waste and pollution. Currently, our economy
works in a take-make-waste system. We take raw materials from the Earth, we make products from
them, and eventually we throw them away as waste. Much of this waste ends up in landfills or
incinerators and is lost. This system can not work in the long term because the resources on our
planet are finite.
Circulate products and materials (at their highest value)
The second principle of the circular economy is to circulate products and materials at their highest
value. This means keeping materials in use, either as a product or, when that can no longer be used,
as components or raw materials. This way, nothing becomes waste and the intrinsic value of
products and materials are retained.
Regenerate nature
The third principle of the circular economy is to regenerate nature. By moving from a take-make-
waste linear economy to a circular economy, we support natural processes and leave more room
for nature to thrive.
Circular economy principles: Regenerate nature (ellenmacarthurfoundation.org)

Completing the picture - How the circular economy tackles climate change -
YouTube
1. Eliminate Waste and Pollution
From Linear to Circular
Circular economy principles: Eliminate waste and pollution
(ellenmacarthurfoundation.org)
With a focus on design, we can eliminate the concept of waste.

Linear: Take, Make, Use, Waste.

Circular: Many products could be circulated by being maintained, shared, reused,
repaired, refurbished, remanufactured, and, as a last resort, recycled. Food and other
biological materials that are safe to return to nature can regenerate the land, fuelling
the production of new food and materials.

Plastics in a Circular Economy | Ellen MacArthur Foundation

2. Circular Economy – Circulate Products and
Materials (Technical and Biological)

Circular economy principle: Circulate products and

materials (ellenmacarthurfoundation.org)
Butterfly diagram animation - YouTube
Designer Clothes Rental | Selfridges Rental
Circular Solutions. Move to Zero.. Nike.com
3. Regenerate Nature

The third principle of the circular economy is to regenerate nature. By moving from a
take-make-waste linear economy to a circular economy, we support natural
processes and leave more room for nature to thrive.
Circular economy principles: Regenerate nature (ellenmacarthurfoundation.org)
ADDITIONAL SLIDE: Vision for plastic in the
circular economy
Elimination of problematic unnecessary plastic packaging.
Re-use models are applied where relevant, reducing the need for single use plastic
In a circular economy, all plastic packaging that we use is designed to be 100%
reusable, recyclable, or compostable
All plastic packaging is reused, recycled or composted in practice.
In a circular economy, the use of plastics is decoupled from the use of finite resources.
All plastics are free from hazardous chemicals, and health, safety and rights of people
involved are respected.

Plastics in a Circular Economy | Ellen MacArthur Foundation

Circular Economy: Business Model
Opportunities
The move to a circular economy model is an example of a radical change, which will
require a new way of thinking and doing business (Bocken, 2016: 312)

(Bocken et al, 2016)

Circular Business Model Strategies

Access and Performance Model Providing the capability or services to satisfy user needs without
needing to own physical products
Extending Product Value Exploiting residual value of products – from manufacture, to
consumers, and then back to manufacturing – or collection of
products between distinct business entities

Classic Long Life Business models focused on delivering long-product life,

supported by design for durability and repair for instance
Encourage Sufficiency Solutions that actively seek to reduce end-user consumption
through principles such as durability, upgradability, service,
warrantees and repairability

CLOSE: Extending Resource Value Exploiting the residual value of resources: collection and sourcing
of otherwise “wasted” materials or resources to turn these into new
forms of value

CLOSE: Industrial Symbiosis A process- orientated solution, concerned with using residual
outputs from one process as feedstock for another process

Bocken, 2016: 313