Sustainable development is one of the big buzz words of our time. And we encounter the new target group of the LOHAS more frequently. But why is this something to think about? What should be our in-put in this as a consumer as well as a developer of products? Consumers are in a state of disentanglement of having too much. This does not mean, however, that they will deny the act of purchasing entirely, but instead of being passive in the act, they want to be involved in the value creation chain of the product: be involved in the conception of the product, know, where it comes from and what it contains.
A great number of large companies work on restructuring their processes to ensure ecologic, environmental, economic and social compatibility. For example, Germany biggest retail company Metro found, that by consistent concentration on goals of sustainable development business processes can be measurably optimized and thereby their own market position could be stabilized and even enlarged. For more information go to their sustainability report:
Metrogroup.de
Even Germanys biggest mail order company OTTO studies the future of ethical consumerism as a trend and OTTOs findings are, that the values of fairplay, credibility, trust and continuity are demanded by consumers. In addition a more sensitive awareness for issues of private data security and abuse is emerging. The central challenge in this is, to go from knowledge to action, from product to interaction and from an attitude of superfluous abundance to scarcitude.
TrendBuero/otto-group-trendstudie-2009-die-zukunft-des-ethischen-konsums
The LOHAS are the major drivers of this trend of ethical consumerism and the identification with the values of this target group is high: 44% of Germanys population agree. What is the definition of a LOHA? LOHA is short for Lifestyle of Health and Sustainability, and the supporters are to be found in all social-economic groups and all generations: they are a new target group definition, and more and more products are designed to engage their desires and expectations. For example, new online-shops offer green designs, like
http://www.sustainable-lifestyle.de
Our favorite product was the Solarcharger fürs IPhone
There is even an award for the best “green gadget”, that will honor innovation in productdesign with a focus on sustainability. http://www.greenergadgets.com/
These are questions, which are also addressed to Luxury brands, and which they have to answer: Of Luxury goods will be expected in general to represent leadership in innovation and the highest possible level of quality in production; and Zeitgeist requires a quality-standard, that includes ecologic compatibility and social awareness. A documentation of irresponsibility against such expectations will be sentenced with no-purchase by the consumer, and this is proven by a study by KPMG:
www.kpmg.de/docs/Luxusmarkt.pdf
But we have a personal recommendation for a small individual piece of freedom from squandering surplus and a small act of sustainability with a large impact on the environment.
Take the strategy of http://www.peopletowels.com/
and don’t use paper towels any more by traveling with your own hand towel.
