Swanky Joins MindfulCommerce to Provide Sustainable Ecommerce Solutions

According to a survey of 1,000 UK consumers conducted by ecommerce shipping platform Sendcloud, 43% of customers feel guilty about the environment when it comes to online shopping. This rises to 48% when purchasing items from outside of Europe.¹

More importantly, a staggering 94% said that sustainability is one of the most important factors when it comes to making online purchases.

“These findings show that consumers understand the environmental impact of their purchases, and are willing to take drastic steps in order to create a more sustainable industry.”

– Rob van den Heuvel, Sendcloud CEO and Co-founder.

With customers increasingly looking for ways to make more sustainable and informed shopping choices, we are so excited to be joining the MindfulCommerce Community, full of environmentally conscious brands, merchants and experts collaborating to make ecommerce a sustainable influence on the world.

The MindfulCommerce Community

Leading the way to a more sustainable ecommerce world by providing a safe place for brands and experts to connect, collaborate and explore opportunities together, MindfulCommerce provides the ideal environment for making greener choices, and we are so excited to be part of the community. They are on a very important mission, and we think it’s only right to get behind it!

“The MindfulCommerce Community is for ecommerce businesses who want to be more sustainable, ethical and have a positive impact in the world. We are a community of ecommerce brands, service providers and developers who are working together to unleash the power of ecommerce as a force for good.”

Check out our very own Swanky profile listing on the The MindfulCommerce Directory here!

Plus, two of our tech partners, Klevu and Okendo, are also part of the MindfulCommerce Community! Klevu, an intelligent site search solution, helps sustainable brands who need to ensure that their marketing is well-timed and well-worded in an increasingly crowded vertical using customer search data. By informing customers with valuable user-generated content, customer marketing platform Okendo significantly reduces return rates which leads to less waste.

How Swanky are maintaining sustainable business practices and improving our social impact

The MindfulCommerce mission is something that closely aligns with our values as a sustainable ecommerce agency working to reduce the environmental impact of online retail.

We recognise that whilst growing efforts are being made to integrate greener initiatives into the ecommerce industry, including eco-friendly packaging and clothing recycling schemes, sustainable solutions have not yet stretched to ecommerce website development and marketing services.

You wouldn’t immediately think that digital can have an environmental impact of its own, but recent reports have shown that each and every email sent has a carbon footprint of 4gm of CO2e (carbon dioxide equivalent)². This relates to the power used by both your computer and data centres to send, filter and read your messages.

By adding just a small attachment, the carbon footprint rises to 19gm, and up to 50gm of CO2e for emails with large or multiple attachments. Shockingly, a typical year of emailing can add 136kg of emissions to your carbon footprint, equivalent to driving over 200 miles in a car!

With this in mind, we at Swanky are committed to delivering sustainable ecommerce solutions and are proud to be a carbon neutral agency.

Earlier this year, we joined forces with Ecologi, an environmental activist organisation which partners with climate projects all over the world to offset carbon emissions. So far we’ve planted 7,326 trees in our ‘Forest of Swank’, supporting reforestation across Madagascar, Nicaragua, Mozambique and even Scotland – offsetting over 561 tonnes of CO2e.

Planting trees in Madagascar. Photo credit: Eden Reforestation Projects and Ecologi.

Through Ecologi, we fund climate projects across the globe which help to create employment opportunities for local families whilst restoring wildlife habitats. These include geothermal power production in West Java, Indonesia; protecting and restoring rainforests in Papua New Guinea and Zimbabwe; onshore wind energy generation in Taiwan; and countless other locations which can be found on our Ecologi page.

We also took several steps to ensure our inaugural Ecommerce Unlocked event in 2021 was carbon positive, if not carbon neutral. These included eliminating single-use plastic at the event, making leaflets and brochures from sustainably sourced and recycled materials, offsetting our carbon footprint through Ecologi, and donating to the Devon Wildlife Trust.

By integrating sustainability into the very core of our operations like this, we’re enabling the brands we work with to minimise their environmental impact as well. We’re proud to be establishing a blueprint for sustainable ecommerce services, supporting our clients and their customers to make more ethical, environmentally-friendly choices.

Your sustainable ecommerce experts

We’re here to help amplify your online business growth – mindfully.

If you’d like to hear more about the sustainable ecommerce services we provide, get in touch with our friendly multidisciplinary team of Shopify Plus experts today.

For reference:

[1] https://www.retailtechnologyreview.com/articles/2021/06/15/uk-consumers-willing-to-take-action-for-greener-future/

[2] https://www.eco2greetings.com/News/The-Carbon-Footprint-of-Email-vs-Postal-Mail.html