Key takeaways• Sustainability may be “the GDPRof 2024” — increasingly not justnice to have, but essential tocustomers and business partners.

Is sustainability theGDPR of 2024?
For a lot of companies, sustainability has been a “nice to have”
item — one bullet point on a corporate governance list or values
statement. That’s changing, says Alex Lassiter. “Sustainability is theGDPR of 2024,” says Lassiter, founder and CEO of GreenPlaces.
The world’s approach to data privacy changed after theEuropean Union’s General Data Protection Regulation went
into effect in 2018, setting off a chain reaction of nationaland state legislation that has affected companies large andsmall in unforeseen ways.
Lassiter believes consumer and investor interest is pushingsustainability toward a similar tipping point. “Remember when
GDPR came out, and you thought: ‘This is something that is
only going to matter if you’re in a global business.’? And theneventually it mattered to everyone,” he says. “Now it’ssustainability’s turn.”
Sustainability is not only a lifestyle choice for many
consumers, he says, but it’s increasingly a priority forbusiness partners. “If you want to be able to attract aninvestment dollar, or file an RFP, or if you work with vendors
who have made it part of what they do, sustainability isbecoming a necessary part of how you do things,” he says.
“It’s part of good hygiene.”

Bank of America Triangle
Innovation Summit
Lassiter and two other innovators in the sustainability spaceshared their experiences at the recent Bank of America
Triangle Innovation Summit.
Lassiter’s GreenPlaces is a sustainability platform that he says
functions like a chief sustainability officer for companies that
don’t have or can’t afford one — handling measurement andreporting requirements, as well as identifying potential
sustainability savings and initiatives.
Another summit panelist, Rachael Classi, founder and CEO ofTiny Earth Toys, says the growing emphasis on sustainability is
being “driven by changes in consumer demand, and theirexpectation for how businesses are run.”• The most successful sustainability
efforts and products makeit irresistible and easy forbusinesses and consumers
to adopt.
• Sustainability is important but
shouldn’t be the primary valueproposition for your productor service.

“Sustainability is just here to stay. For Gen Z
consumers, for example, it’s table stakes.”
Rachael Classi, Founder/CEO, Tiny Earth Toys

Tiny Earth Toys offers parents a “circular subscription”: They
receive a regular shipment of new or gently used toys timed totheir child’s development stage — toys that are then swappedout after two months. Classi says her company’s experience
shows that consumer interest in sustainability has spilled overto investors. “There is a growing ecosystem of investors who
are focused on the narrowest of niches,” she said. “There areplenty of circular economy funds who are only focused on
businesses like mine.”
Although investors, business partners and consumers are
creating new demand and expectations for sustainability,
consumer-facing efforts often miss the mark. These
entrepreneurs shared lessons about successfully pitchingsustainability for consumer buy-in.
It’s about behavior, not intent: Classi says behavior change
is critical to making a sustainability effort work. “It’s not just theintent that consumers might have for doing the right thing orcaring about the next generation. It’s the behavior change thatneeds to happen,” she says. “And big change is going to happen
when that behavior change is ingrained — when we automaticallythink about the end life of the products we consume.”

is sustainability the gdpr of 2024?

Make it irresistible: Josh Dorfman, co-founder and CEO ofPlantd, says a company’s ability to get buy-in from consumers
and businesses depends on having the right products andchoices. “It’s incumbent upon companies like ours and otherentrepreneurs to design exceptional products that make itirresistible for big companies to actually drive change,”
Dorfman says.

“The sustainability solutions that show up
really have to be above and beyond fantastic.”
Josh Dorfman, Co-Founder/CEO, Plantd

Make it easy: Dorfman, author of “The Lazy Environmentalist,”says sustainability programs need to fit into people’s lives andcompanies’ ways of doing business. “How do you make green
products integrate directly into people’s lives, so they don’t
really have to change?” he says. Plantd says it uses technology
to create “carbon-negative” building materials that substitutefor traditional materials. “We’re fundamentally changing theproduction technology for the building materials, the walls,
the roof, subfloor, everything, so that we can change theeconomics — and then we get to a finished product that’s moremoisture-resistant, it’s stronger, it has less petrochemicals, it’scost-effective,” he says. “And fundamentally, from a lazyenvironmental point of view, it’s designed to install in exactly
the same way as what builders use today.”Don’t make it the primary value proposition: Lassiter andClassi believe that sustainability alone can’t sell a concept. Says
Lassiter: “People don’t buy our tool because it’s sustainable orzero emissions. It’s a fundamentally better technology than ourcompetitors. And that’s why people buy it. It’s just a bonus that
we’re sustainable.”
Agrees Classi, “The value proposition we’re delivering is not
circularity and sustainability; the value proposition we’reoffering is clutter reduction in your home. And that you’re goingto have this exceptional experience every time you unbox ourtoys. When you go on our website, there’s not a lot aboutsaving the Earth or doing your part.”
Dorfman says Plantd wouldn’t work if it wasn’t sellingbuilding materials that first promised durability. “Carbon
reduction is a huge part of it — because people care about
it. But it’s also durability in your home. If you want to build abusiness around sustainability, you start by meeting yourcustomer where your customer is,” he says. “You have tocreate value for your customer.”
All three entrepreneurs reiterate that sustainability’s time hascome. “It’s not ‘if’ this will become a requirement for you to dowhat you do. It’s ‘when,’” says Lassiter.

“It’s inevitable. All of us are going to haveto do this stuff, no matter how small or
how big your business is.”Alex Lassiter, Founder/CEO, GreenPlaces

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