If you’ve recently been asked to take on sustainability responsibilities in a company that makes or sells physical products, you might be asking yourself – ‘What are the biggest sustainability risks or hotspots in our products and packaging?’. You’re not alone, that’s a great question but I would also suggest you ask – ‘What are the biggest opportunities that thinking about sustainability, could offer us?’
When it comes to sustainability, the biggest risks and opportunities often lie within the products and packaging you make and sell. These are typically the most resource and carbon intensive parts of every business, making up the majority of your environmental footprint.
Here are four key hotspots to consider:
- Raw Materials and Sourcing
The sustainability story starts with what your products are made of. Are the materials renewable, recycled, responsibly sourced — or are they virgin, finite, and energy-intensive to extract? This is where risks like deforestation, water scarcity, and human rights concerns can enter your supply chain. - Packaging
Packaging is often the most visible symbol of waste to customers and can be a reputational risk. New polluter pays legislation targeting packaging, also means that less sustainable packaging will cost you more. Common issues include over-packaging, use of mixed materials (which are hard to recycle), and reliance on single use plastics. This is usually a great place to find quick wins, and give you the confidence to start to address the bigger issues. - Carbon Footprint
Every stage of the product lifecycle, from manufacturing and transport, to product use and disposal, emits greenhouse gases. Your products’ total life cycle emissions may be higher than you think, especially if you haven’t measured them yet. High carbon materials (like aluminium or certain plastics), complex or high speed logistics, energy-intensive production and the use phase are key contributors. If you want to measure your carbon impact then you need to start with the baseline. - End-of-Life and Waste
What happens to your product at the end of its life? Can it be reused, repaired, ungraded? It is best not to rely on it being recycled, as we know that actual recycling rates are much lower than we’d like. What mechanisms could you use to keep products out of landfill? There are so many opportunities in this space to save money and create value. Consider how you could work with your supply chain to retrieve materials and components at the end of life, to feed into your manufacturing. Or could your waste be someone else’s raw materials?
Where to Start?
You don’t need to have all the answers right away. Start by mapping your product and packaging life cycle. Talk to procurement, operations, and even customers. Look for those “hotspots” – areas where environmental or social impacts are high and easy to address.
By identifying these, you’ll be in a stronger position to make smart decisions, set priorities, and make sustainability strategic opportunity.
The Design abacus can be a really useful tool to support this activity: Using the Design Abacus to value intangible qualities | EN:ABLE Sustainability
If you feel you’d benefit from a bit more support mapping your product’s sustainability hotspots email me to arrange a no obligation consultation – let’s talk about how I can make a difference in your business. I offer manageable packages of project support to help move you forward in your sustainability journey. Follow me on Linked In to keep up to date and sign up to my newsletter for tops tips and insightful sustainable innovations.
#ecodesign #greendesign #circularity #designabacus
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