4 lessons I learned as a marketing leader of a sustainable brand

Giving a TED talk on sustainable fashion in 2019 wearing a custom shirt made from hemp fabric

In 2018, I joined India’s first and most recognizable cannabis startup, Bombay Hemp Company backed by investors like Ratan Tata, and became the founding member of their sustainable textile brand, Hemp Fabric Lab.

But that’s not what attracted me to them. I truly believed in their mission to make hemp and sustainable fashion mainstream.

Watch my TED talk here.

Bombay Hemp Company already had two established brands selling food and apparel items that had been around for three and five years respectively.

In spite of this, Hemp Fabric Lab quickly became a known name in India and had strong industry associations. And we did this without spending excessively on marketing.

Here are 4 things I learned as a marketer of a sustainable brand :

1. People care about looking good vs sustainability — As much as some of us care about saving the planet, the hard truth is that a majority of people’s priorities are different. Ultimately, people want to satisfy their emotional needs, like status, and prestige, and looks more than saving animals or farmer livelihoods. So while you should embed sustainability in your business strategy, pretend like you’re selling a regular product that’s offering 5x better value for money than your competitor. Do that well and you’re a winner.
2. Social proofing is your secret weapon — People love comparing themselves to one another. If one person has an X brand of car and boasts about it, then the other person wants the same or a better version of it. Social proofing is a great technique for people to buy something easily with less effort from a brand’s side. If done well, a brand can save a lot of marketing dollars. Because hemp was gaining traction and people were starting to talk about it in positive ways, half our sales job was done by social proofing.
3. Build trust by educating — This is a really effective strategy if you want to build brand equity, trust, and loyalty. A lot of our B2B clients were skeptical of the cost because hemp fabrics look and feel like linen and cotton. But at Hemp Fabric Lab, our goal was always to educate first rather than behave like a slick salesman. It worked brilliantly.
4. Don’t compromise on the quality or pricing — Big brands always try to squeeze their suppliers on their margins so we made sure to not fall prey to that. A lot of our products were super high quality and we never compromised on that for the sake of a sale. Instead, we came out with a more reasonable range for buyers who were cost-conscious. It’s better to maintain your standards and attract quality clients than sacrifice quality for the sake of pleasing a few clients who’re more interested in the price than the actual product.

If you own a sustainable brand, either B2B or B2C that’s already behaving responsibly, then your focus should be more on offering your clients or your customers the highest amount of benefits that reduce their pain points, and great customer service.

If you’ve nailed that, then sustainability will become a bonus add-on for your target audience.

You can also learn more about my work here.