We had the swinging 60s, activist 70s, bad-hair 80s, hedonistic 90s, and a disastrous end to the ‘noughties’. Decades of rampant consumerism and look what we have to show for it. The mindless accumulation of ‘stuff’. The $2 mentality. Maybe it was the shock of a new millennium, or really seeing the effects of environmental degradation, but the last decade was also characterised by the mass consumer awakening to environmental issues, sustainability, and the impact of purchasing decisions.

Even the guys in suits are getting it. 

As we leave this decade behind and start work in a fresh new one, sustainability is only going to become more of a competitive advantage. I’m not saying we are entering an utopian era of sunshine and rainbows, because a warm fuzzy feeling alone is not enough to sustain a business’s bottom line.

And it doesn’t have to.

There is now a multibillion dollar market for more environmental and ethical products and services. The low carbon and environmental goods and services market (LCEGS) was recently estimated to have globally been worth £3 trillion in 2008. Recent Colmar Brunton research shows the market is growing faster than we thought – they estimate close to 50 per cent of consumers are now looking for ‘green-cred’ when buying products.

Looking past just consumer products, there is huge potential for higher level green technology and innovation, and in a corporate context, for green business initiatives.

Sustainability is no longer a nice-sounding concept; it’s a serious business opportunity.

Scientist and former Australian of the Year Tim Flannery puts it in perspective as the next natural progression of industry.

“With every revolution we have had, from wood to coal, from coal to oil, and now from oil to renewables, profits have increased. That’s the way the world is.”

Sustainable Business Network (SBN) Chief Executive Rachel Brown explains it is a simple matter of supply and unmet demand.

“The marketplace is frustrated because the products and services aren’t there yet,” she says. “I think there are a lot of people out there in the market saying, ‘if it was there I would buy it’ but it is not there so they feel trapped into buying stuff they don’t actually want.”

The costs of overlooking this growing trend in the market could be devastating. “I think any business that doesn’t have its finger on the pulse in its market is really in potential risk.”

Before organics were hip or even widely accepted, Chris Morrison and two business partners created drinks company Phoenix Organics. It was 1986 – they were trailblazers. Morrison now chairs the SBN board and is still involved with some cutting edge stuff – upsetting big American corporates and helping to rebuild the Samoan economy with organic fair trade bananas for example. He says, and Brown agrees, the innovative mindset of the eco-entrepreneur manifests itself today in what has come to be known as ‘clean technology’.

Advances, particularly in small scale sustainable energy companies, are happening thick and fast in response to growing demand.

 “We know people are trying to find renewable, clean technologies for the future – the world is screaming out for these solutions,” Brown says. “They don’t want fossil fuels burning. They don’t want anything that is going to leave nasty stuff behind like nuclear currently does.”

Notable projects in the pipeline include scientists and entrepreneurs looking at the development of ‘biomimicry’ to create energy solutions.

“They go and look at what nature does to generate energy and then replicate it,” Brown says. “They have mimicked kelp, they have used the same idea of anchoring something to the ground and then every time it moves with the sea it generates power. They make the technology really cheap and really light. These ideas are bubbling to the surface in all sorts of places – they are really small companies but they have the potential to be massive.”

Clean technology is the darling of the sustainability space. Brown says the SBN intends to support it by marrying the ideas with the entrepreneurs. “Businesses need ideas and one of the great things about the network is you bring the trail blazer guys together with the businesses who think there is an opportunity but don’t know what it is.

“So it is a little like the Phoenix Organics idea. Everyone was going ‘oh you are a bloody idiot, it will never happen’ and then they just break through,” she says.

Sustainability requires the ability to think outside the three walls of your office cubicle.

At the recent national SBN awards, Kiwibank took out the Emerging Large and Corporate Business category. The award is designed for businesses that have over 20 employees and have become formally involved in sustainability within the last two years.

Murray Wu is the bank’s General Manager of Business Transformation. He says they take a more holistic approach:

 “It is about good business, and as a side note it is hard to pull business out from sustainability.”

“Sustainability isn’t necessarily about going out in the community and painting Kindy fences and all that stuff, but [about] how you make your business last for the long haul and generate the benefits for community that are meaningful to them,” he says.

“There are just some things that other companies do well that we won’t go and do because it is not our strength and it’s not where we think our focus is. For example going and doing a whole lot of complex environmental initiatives, it’s just not our space, but on the other hand helping educate people about finances or helping small business start up, that is.”

Kiwibank, while gratified by the win, is wary of overplaying it.

“We look at our competitors and some of them are doing some fantastic stuff and they are sponsoring this that and the other and their names are all over the place,” Wu says. “We didn’t know if we would meet the expectations of people in the sustainability world. We are quite sensitive to it, even though now we have won an award and all that, when we look at what we do, we would still be careful about what we say about it.”

Greenwash. It continues to be the white noise of sustainability. As companies see its competitive edge they are frantically rushing to out-green each other with harried and increasingly desperate-looking efforts. Morrison says there are so many measures of what is ‘good’ now consumers are confused. “There just seems to be new labels coming all the time whether it is zero carbon or whether it is organics, no animal cruelty, vegan, or heart tick.

“There are just more and more and more so that is becoming more and more difficult for consumers to decipher what’s real and what isn’t.”

There are also those in the marketplace that are deliberately misleading consumers with bad science, by manipulating the figures, or lying by omission. Brown says there are some epic contradictions out there of cigarettes-in-recycled-packaging proportions.

“That is ripping off the market and the thing is the market is not that bloody stupid I would like to think.” She says the Sustainable Business Network comes in handy in helping to sort the genuine from the jumped up.

“That is one really important role that we are playing – supporting the market. We are always looking at how we can speed up the uptake of sustainable products, help businesses identify what the opportunities are and then promote those businesses to the market place.”

Brown has been deeply involved with the SBN since founding it in 2002 – she knows it is more than a passing fancy; that sustainability and clean technology are and will continue to be a source of competitive advantage.

 “Some people think it is a fad and it will go away, I guess for some people they have seen it kind of bouncing along for years. But now there is quite a loud heartbeat in this space so I think they would be dumb not to be in there.”