10 Best Business Sustainability Strategies & Solutions For Business Growth

Introduction

Many brands and companies are now moving towards creating a more sustainable business to promote the holistic development of society. It is a common misconception that making the brand more sustainable would entail immense costs.

However, in this article, we will give you simple and sustainable business tips and show you ways in which you can create a more sustainable infrastructure without much difficulty and costs. Let’s know the 10 best business sustainability strategies and solutions.

1. Research

Before taking measures to make your business more sustainable, it is essential first to assess and understand what a sustainable business is. Understanding your business’ models from a sustainability perspective requires you first to understand what sustainable living and companies are. This will help you in making the correct decisions for your business. Here are a few steps you can take to conduct your research:

• Read about Sustainable Development Goals (SDG): This includes a list of 17 goals prepared by the UN that provide a blueprint to creating a sustainable future. The goals include a variety of things such as energy efficiency, environmental protection, gender equality, etc. Understanding these goals will give you a better perspective on what is a sustainable practice.
• Analyse your business model: Next, you can assess your business model from the perspective of these SDGs and analyse what areas need improvement. This also involves understanding your finances. Use tools like OkCredit to make accounting simple and automated. This will give you an idea of the kind of steps you can afford to take.
• Study other businesses: Finding solutions to build a more sustainable business is not easy. However, studying green business examples can help in giving you the right direction. This will provide you with case studies of tried and tested methods that businesses have used— giving you ideas and strategies to implement in your industry.

2. Sustainability by design

Many businesses have tried to be sustainable, but their efforts have not translated into any results. This is because the business views achieving sustainability are only a part of its business model and not its core. Such an effort often is not enough to override the harms caused by the business and only remains a marketing gimmick. This “greenwashing” of sustainability does not yield any benefits and is what prevents sustainable development from happening.

Thus, it is essential to include sustainability in every aspect of your business and not restrict it to a particular level. Sustainability should be a rule and not an exception. However, this does not mean that you have to transform your business entirely overnight. You can start small but always aim to progress towards more.

3. Paperless

One of the best and easiest sustainable practices examples is to go paperless. Administrative work, accounting and other activities within the business can cause a lot of paper wastage. However, we now have the technology to go completely digital. Sharing and accessing files and documents is now much easier than it was before. Hence cutting down on paper usage is a significant first step. Here is how you can implement a paperless strategy:

• Limit printing supplies: Ample availability often leads to unnecessary printing and wastage. Limiting the stock of paper and printers in your office will make everyone conscious about their paper usage and help them build a digital habit.
• Use of software: Using software that quickly helps your team members connect and share files, tasks, and notes can help eliminate the need for papers.

4. Plastic-less packaging

If you are into a product business, eliminating plastic packaging can make a massive difference to your carbon footprint. Paper and other organic packaging materials are also cheaper and easy to access, thus, saving you on costs. You can also eliminate packaging where it is not necessary.

For example, the vegetable and fruit industry is criticised for individually plastic wrapping items. Such items are cleaned and washed anyway and do not need additional packaging. Another way of reducing packaging is to pack as per the orders. This will help you in combining similar orders and pack them together instead of individually packed. This will also help save time.

5. Long-wear products

Overconsumption is one of the leading causes of environmental damage. For example, fast fashion companies thrive on creating cheap clothing that does not last long to encourage consumption. However, improving the quality of your products can go a long way in creating a sustainable business. Make your higher and better quality products so that it lasts longer and is not thrown away after a few uses. This will increase customer satisfaction and will allow you to charge more for your better products. This ensures that you don’t lose out on your revenue.

6. Donate

As a business, you will have a limited capacity to contribute towards sustainable development. You may lack resources, expertise and time to yourself donate to the causes you want to. However, it is common for businesses to face this problem. Thus, an excellent way to contribute is to help people who have the expertise and resources.

You can collaborate with NGOs and other organisations working towards the cause that interests you and help them either monetarily or through other means. An added benefit to this is that you can often claim tax deductions in many countries for the donations you make. It is, therefore, a win-win!

7. Limiting commute

The pandemic has taught us to do almost every task virtually. So many functions that were done offline have now seamlessly integrated into the online space. This shows that we can easily limit the tasks that need to be done even in a post-pandemic world.

Commute to and fro from offices subtly adds significantly to the environmental damage. Commuting can also cause stress in people and affect their mental health. Limiting commute and reducing the office presence of team members can also create a more sustainable environment.

Limiting commute also applies to your business products. If your business model allows it, you should consider switching to selling digital products. This limits the delivery related commute. For example, if you are a publishing business, you can sell e-copies and digital editions of your publications.

8. Supply chain management

As mentioned above, sustainable development is about environmental protection and building a good ecosystem that does not exploit anyone. Thus, it is important to evaluate your entire supply and production chain to ensure all your products are ethically created. The fast fashion industry often sees that the clothes are manufactured in sweatshops in poor Asian countries like Bangladesh, Indonesia, etc.

Workers are paid less than minimum wage for working inhumane hours. This social cost is attributable to the fast fashion industry, even though they are not directly involved. Similarly, you must evaluate where all your raw materials are coming from in order and whether they are made ethically.

9. Sustainable work ethics

In addition to the social costs of unfair wage labour, it is crucial to building good and fair work ethics. Sustainability involves various aspects such as gender equality, fair wages and a healthy working environment. It is critical to ensure and build a sustainable work culture within your business to ensure that the products produced by the company do not incur high social costs.

Using tools like OkStaff can help you in creating a sustainable work ethic. They allow you to track the attendance and payroll of employees, which ensures you provide a happy and sustainable work culture for everyone.

10. Customer engagement

If your customers are not engaged in your sustainable efforts, it can create a disconnect with your brand. This will not help make them understand your struggles. Thus it is vital to engage your customers in your initiatives. Such initiatives are great for marketing your products as well. Some brands have started initiatives allowing customers to return old packaging or clothes. This involves the customers in the process and makes them understand your message better.

Conclusion

Sustainable practices are not only beneficial for society but also for the business. Using tools like OkCredit and OkStaff can help in managing various administrative tasks like accounting and task management. These tools can help ease your workload and focus on other important aspects of the business. These small tips and strategies will make your business a prime green business example. Start small and make your business more sustainable.

Also read:

1) How small business promotes industrialisation?
2) Impact of Lockdown on Indian Economy
3) GST: Is this a benefit to the Economy?
4) How funding boosts Startups to redefine Indian Economy?
5) OkCredit: Simple, Paperless & Secure solution for businesses

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FAQs

Q. How to measure the level of sustainability?

Ans. Setting goals and targets can help in creating a blueprint for sustainability. You can measure the fulfilment of these goals to understand how sustainable your business is.

Q. How to make customers choose sustainable options?

Ans. It is necessary to create awareness about sustainability to make consumers switch. Along with that, one must make the switch easy for the customer. If customers have to take additional steps to be more sustainable, they are less likely to pick your product over an easily accessible one.

Q. What software to use to reduce paper consumption?

Ans. Digitising can help in cutting down paper consumption. Use apps like OkCredit to maintain accounts digitally. It is more convenient and easy to use than paper bahi khata and is also a sustainable option.