Catherine Weetman MSc FCILT FRSA - Director, Rethink Global Catherine gives talks, workshops and advice on the circular economy and sustainability. Her award-winning book, A Circular Economy Handbook for Business and Supply Chains, published by Kogan Page, includes wide-ranging examples and practical tips. Catherine has over 25 years' experience in contract logistics, manufacturing, retail and supply chain consultancy, and her career spans food, fashion and logistics, including Tesco, Kellogg's and DHL Supply Chain. She is a Visiting Fellow at the University of Huddersfield, and a Mentor and Regional Organiser for the Circular Economy Club
Charles Ross is a specialist in Performance Sportswear Design & sustainable matters, focusing on issues like Forever Chemicals (highlighted by the movie Dark Waters), the Plastics-in-the-Ocean, ReGenerative Agriculture. We discuss a range of sustainability issues related to Outdoor Clothing designs and materials, including the issue of over-consumption
Tom Szaky, founder of TerraCycle, tells us how the Loop reusable packaging platform is bringing the convenience of prefill to high streets everywhere. TerraCycle and Loop are tackling the root causes of waste, including single use and disposable items.
We hear why they chose prefill, and why reuse needs to ‘feel disposable’. Tom explains how they are helping big brands and retailers to make the business case, feel confident about moving forward, and scale up from pilots to in-store roll-outs.
Gavin Fernie-Jones founded One Tree at a Time, an amazing circular social enterprise for outdoor gear and ski-wear, sharing value with the community and nature. Living in the Alps, Gavin has seen for himself the impact global warming has had in the mountains he calls home. He’s always loved the outdoors, having grown up living in an outdoor centre, but it was while running his bootfitting business The Boot Lab that he realised the impact his business was having on the environment.
Gavin started making small changes to the way that business operated, and seeing the results of this inspired him to start a social enterprise called One Tree at a Time.
One Tree at a Time is embedding circular approaches to change behaviours, build community and protect the mountain environment. The One Tree team has tapped into some surprising sources of ‘waste’ to create value for local people and help build and strengthen local connections. On top of that, One Tree at a Time supports businesses and individuals to change behaviour and protect their mountain environment.
Odyssey Innovation collects and recycles marine plastic into kayaks and other products. In 2020, we heard about the UK south-west coast operations – now it is expanding, with the Net Generation Scheme – helping the fishing industry, local government and lots of other stakeholders to create a scalable circular solution to reduce marine plastics. This is something that could expand around the world!
Solving customer problems is at the heart of a successful product or service – but what if you’ve misunderstood your customer’s pain points?
Today’s episode is one of my regular round ups of the last 9 conversations, exploring the theme of customer Pain Points. We’ll look at this from the perspective of businesses, and citizens – you and me. Some of those pain points are being overlooked by companies – that could be because they have a one-size-fits-all approach that might create value for one customer group, but doesn’t deliver, or may actually destroy value for another group.
New pain points are cropping up too – knowing that our choices aren’t contributing to a fairer, healthier and more sustainable world is bothering more and more of us.
RubyMoon, based in Brighton in the UK, is already using recycled fibres from Ocean Plastics to make its active wear products, and now wants to go further through research projects that overcome the technical challenges of recovering and recycling the kind of textiles commonly used in swimwear.
Jo explains that this project focuses on two key fabric elements, Nylon 6 – a strong, durable polyamide, and Elastane, that makes the fabric stretchy so it fits well and supports activites like swimming and other sports.
The challenge is how to find mechanical and chemical methods of breaking down polyamide elastane, that are both cost-effective and environmentally sound.
There’s a second ambitious project too, developing a nano trace to embed into the material so that it can be identified and recovered, to make sure it goes back into the closed loop system.
Increase your success with new ideas | The Secret Life of Stuff | Circular business ‘sprint’ beta | BlackRock’s Circular Economy Fund | Seth Godin on recycling | Podcast 68 with Kresse Wesling
Kresse Wesling, CBE, is a multi-award winning environmental entrepreneur. After first meeting the London Fire Brigade in 2005, Kresse launched Elvis & Kresse, which rescues and transforms decommissioned fire hose into innovative lifestyle products and returns 50% of profits to the Fire Fighters Charity.The company now collects 12 different waste streams and has several charitable partnerships and collaborations across a number of industry sectors.
Circular business ‘sprint’ beta |Circular rebound – good or bad? | Less is More | Financing Net Zero | Circular and Future Fit| Podcasts 66 and 67
Megan O’Connor is co-founder and CEO of Nth Cycle, a metal processing company that has developed technology to enable a clean, domestic, and streamlined supply of critical minerals for the clean energy transition.
Megan tells us how she came up with the idea for using electro-extraction, a technology developed by her co-founder for a completely different application, and how she then pivoted the entire focus of her PhD to develop this.