Brand design business, FreshBritain has launched a new regenerative brand design approach and philosophy that it believes will transform the way brands think about sustainable growth and in time trigger an industry-wide turning point.
Founder and co-owner Bob Sheard has seen that brands need help to move away from the destructive cycle of consumption that is depleting the earth’s resources. To date, brand growth has been socially obsessive, economically impulsive, ecologically regressive and politically addictive.
Bob Sheard explains: “We are on an urgent journey to rethink how we define, measure and pursue growth while still driving profits, but in a context where we acknowledge that our world’s resources are finite; what we call surviving and thriving “beyond zero”.
We cannot rely on politicians to take the lead as politics is addicted to degenerative growth not regenerative growth. Politics is structurally short term and competitive. The solution needs to be long term and collaborative and brands need to take the lead in reimagining what growth looks like for the sake of all of our futures.”
FreshBritain’s vision is supported by 21 new corporate, brand and product design protocols that will guide boardrooms and brands that are on their regenerative journeys by identifying the key questions they need to address, as well as providing a language that reveal the answers. These protocols will help companies transition away from a dependence on physical production and making ever more “stuff” and provide a pathway of growth solutions that harness knowledge, intelligence and experience as the three key core pillars which will drive purpose-led growth.
The protocols have been conceived in an academic partnership with Central Saint Martins and the University of the Arts. The protocols will not be fixed but will remain fluid; FreshBritain will continuously research and develop each protocol so that the latest intelligence and know-how can be drawn down for any of its clients.
Commenting on this new chapter in the agency’s history, Bob Sheard says: “Over the last 25 years, our calling card of shrewd brand design has driven enterprise value in the companies and investors we have worked with. We believe now is the time to offer regenerative brand design as a means of driving regenerative growth. Good growth enables brands to meet their Paris commitments, to transform revenue and rethink production and transform profit and rethink consumption.
“I do see this as utterly urgent. If we aren’t brave enough to take action now, in five to ten years it will be too late. And to emphasise the boldness of our vision, we have christened our regenerative initiatives collectively as “The Future of Everything”. In time, if brands take this on board it could change consumerism as we know it, with brands focused on driving positive impact. Consumers are already ahead of us and increasingly looking to be defined more by what they do and experience than by what they have and own – in other words, buying the change they want to see.”
In conclusion, Bob Sheard says: “We don’t have all the answers. FreshBritain has proven that brand design can effectively drive conventional growth and enterprise value. We are confident it is also capable of driving a new kind of growth that makes the world better, where the focus is on replenishing.”
FreshBritain’s regenerative principles have been “pressure tested” in partnership with The Madresfield Estate to create a proof of concept brand “Mad about Land” Garden wear. New thinking and protocols that continue to emerge from this initiative will be tested in this evolving case study before its application to other FB clients.
FreshBritain hosts its first “Future of Everything” event to launch its regenerative brand design thinking on 21st March at Central St Martins, Granary Square, Kings Cross. Speakers at the event included Taha Bawa, Unicef/Goodwall; Jonathan Chevenix-Trench, Madresfield/Mad About Land; George Lamb, Wildfarmed; Rebecca Wright D&AD/CSM; David Richards, Aston Martin/F1/FIA/Prodrive; Marcello Bottoli, Louis Vuitton/Boggi Milano.
FreshBritain will open source all the knowledge that is revealed at this and future events in its “Future of Everything” series.