The Corporate Knights Global 100 (the top ranked sustainability companies) turned 20 this year. This gives us 20 years of comparative data to consider. This article covers the following points:
- As you would expect, the Global 100 earns more of its revenue from sustainable solutions. In fact, compared to the average large public company, the difference is 3x
- As you would also expect, the Global 100 invests more in sustainable solutions. Also 3x the average large public company
- This focus has proved wise, as the Global 100 has outperformed the average large public company by 6% in total returns
- When we move away from the Global 100 and just look at all companies, sustainable capital expenditures grew 2x general capital expenditures
- Again, looking at all companies, sustainable revenue grew 2x general revenue
Net, even if your company is not one of the world’s top rated sustainable companies, you should be seeing revenues from sustainable programs/products growing twice as fast as revenues from non-sustainable programs/products.
If you are a SME, this gap should be even wider, as the competition is less fierce (97% of large companies have sustainable programs but less than 1% of SMEs have sustainable programs, allowing certified sustainable SMEs to more easily create competitive differentiation via sustainability certification). Studies show certified sustainable SMEs are seeing 7x – 20x growth versus their non-certified peers.
If you are not enjoying this level of growth via your sustainable efforts or versus your competition, you might want to consider a new strategy.
This post explains what sustainability program you should have and this master class explains why you want this.
Contact us if this is of interest.