đ Why Sustainability Isn't Sexy Anymore
Let's explore why it lost its spark and how marketing can make people care about the planet again - with 5 brand ideas. The good news: This isnât the end of sustainability but a sign of growth.
Hi đ Iâm Florian Schleicher. This is the FutureStrategies newsletter. Thank you so much for reading along đ
I am a marketing strategist. And my heart beats for sustainability.
But that beating drum feels a little bit broken right now.
And I am not alone in that.
The generation with the most at stake in a sustainable future feels a real lack of agency to shape it.
My own sustainability journey started back when I worked at McDonaldâs and questioned some of the approaches when it came to âdoing goodâ.
Then I worked for Greenpeace and thought âwe are fuâŹ#edâ just being overwhelmed by seeing so many things that are going the wrong direction.
Then I started my dream job of being Head of Marketing of the food-saving app Too Good To Go. For 2.5 years I felt like actually having an impact of changing things for the better.
It also was a good time for sustainability.
2019 was the peak of the green movement.
Greta was spearheading a global movement of student protests, we all went out to huge street protests, the EU Green Deal was introduced, the wave for electric cars was changing the automotive industry and producing solar energy got cheaper than fossil fuels.
Then came Covid.
Then the war in Ukraine.
The conflicts in the Middle East.
Inflation of everyday goods.
And by the time AI amazed all of us, no one was talking about sustainability anymore.
A recent study by BBMG reveals this significant shift: The number of Gen Zs globally who feel âindifferentâ about sustainability has increased from 22% to 31% since 2021, while climate âenthusiastsâ have declined from 30% to 21%.
And itâs not just Gen Z thatâs reportedly feeling less engaged in the planet. The number of people who say helping the environment is important to them has been declining worldwide, a downward trend thatâs reflected among Gen Alphas as well.
Now it feels like the sustainability movement has entered a deep sleep phase.
Yes, some companies - especially big ones - still keep pushing their sustainability agenda. But many also stopped communicating about it, because of fear of backlash - leading to Greenhushing.
So when your heart beats for sustainability, it can feel like⊠no one cares anymore.
Now, I am still a marketing strategist.
I am still an optimist and thus I think there is a way out of this.
So this time I want to dive deeper on:
đŠ WHY Sustainability Communications has such a hard time right now
𧩠WHAT could help us to revive it
đ HOW strategic Marketing can help us getting there
đ Making sustainability sexy again
I aim to arrive at some newfound clarity, new perspectives and maybe even some optimism.
Ready? Letâs go.
đŠ WHY is Sustainability Communications in trouble?
There are three big issues I see here:
PROBLEM 1: Sustainability is not an intrinsic need.
Or at least not for 99% of the population.
If we look at the pyramid of human needs by Abraham Maslow, we can see what humans care about: Our physiological needs, our safety, we want to love and belong, feel respect and self-actualise ourselves.
Only if the bottom needs (e.g. we have food) are met, we can actually care about higher needs (e.g. we want to feel loved). It makes sense, because only when I have an actual roof over my head can I invite people over who make me feel respected.
99% of the human race just wants to live a good, safe, loving, progressing life.
âSustainabilityâ is no need that anyone apart from the lucky 1% who see the connections and have the luxury of having arrived at the very top of the pyramid, actually has.
And here is a first insight we could use to our advantage in sustainability communications: Air, Water, Food, Shelter - the bottom layer - actually depend on the climate, are threatened by any change.
But I am getting ahead of myself.
Back in 2019 in the EU we were in that lucky position: Seeing the connection of behaving more sustainable to our wellbeing. Because in a way, all our other needs were met. So we had the societal support and political will to think about changes to keep our environment in the way that it is.
And this doesnât just matter for brands. Political parties face the same challenge. How do you inspire people to act on long-term issues when daily fears dominate? The answer lies in storytelling - not in speeches, but in symbols, emotions, and belonging.
Now here we have to talk about psychology.
The classic filter/âbottleneck models of attention (e.g., Donald Broadbentâs Filter Model) illustrate that humans only process a limited amount of sensory or informational input at a time.
So, when sustainability sits alongside many other crises (pandemic, war, inflation, etc) there is simply less attentional âbandwidthâ left for it.
When people are cognitively exhausted, they retreat from complex issues that require long-term thinking and systemic awareness.
Sustainability is one of those. It demands reflection, patience, interconnection, mental control - things that are hard to hold when we fear for our safety or our ability to afford daily life.
As psychologist Daniel Goleman put it,
âOverloading attention shrinks mental control. Life immersed in digital distractions creates a near constant cognitive overload. And that overload wears out self-control.â
In short: This doesnât work when we fear for our safety or our ability to afford stuff.
PROBLEM 2: Numbers donât vibe.
Scientists have known about the problem of fossil fuels for our environment since the 1950s. A lot has happened in that time. But also not a lot at all.
That has two reasons:
The effort and ability of fossil fuel companies to discredit the environmental movement and their own responsibility.
The inability of the sustainability bubble to get the mainstream on board.
I just want to focus on the second part here, because the first you can read a ton about everywhere.
How was the sustainability movement started? By scientists.
And they love numbers, facts, statistics.
The problem is, the mainstream population doesnât.
People listen to stories. They connect emotionally. They want simple solutions.
So for decades sustainability communication did a great job speaking to - at a maximum - 10% of the population. Not enough for a tipping point.
