Sustainable Brands Spotlights SB’16 Copenhagen Program

L’Oréal, Procter & Gamble, Kingfisher, LEGO and others to assemble around sustainability-led brand innovation
Jul 21, 2016 10:00 AM ET

SAN FRANCISCO, July 21, 2016 /3BL Media/ – Sustainable Brands® spotlights SB’16 Copenhagen this week as the Northern European business community prepares to gather at the Radisson Blu Scandinavian Hotel in Copenhagen on September 26-28th to collaborate on how sustainability-led innovation can be an essential driver of business success and value creation.

SB’16 Copenhagen will bring senior business leaders, thought leaders and sustainability practitioners who are influencing the way brands innovate and communicate together to demonstrate the power of purpose-driven leadership. Organizations and brands attending include: Novozymes, IKEA, GlobeScan, BASF, Kingfisher, HEINEKEN, The Body Shop, Philips Lighting, DONG Energy, L’Oréal, WBCSD, Dell and others.

“The economic landscape in Europe, and around the world, is changing. Consumer trust in brands is declining worldwide, putting at risk trillions of dollars of brand value,” states KoAnn Vikoren Skrzyniarz, founder of Sustainable Brands.  “This upheaval is inevitable as our global economy responds to deeper interconnectivity and the recognition of a future of limits. The good news, however, is that brands that are courageously tapping purpose to create value are demonstrating substantially more resilience through this transition. Slapping a new tagline on a brand isn’t enough. Leader brands in the Sustainable Brands community are finding new ways to deliver shared value, testing new business models, and tapping a wealth of new tools and partnerships to create and scale positive impact leading to greater revenue growth and profit. SB’16 Copenhagen will convene these leader brands to learn from one another and collaborate on the shared objective to find ways to succeed in business by shifting the world toward a flourishing future.”

Discussions will focus on the environmental, social and economic macro forces that are creating system conditions for purpose-driven businesses as well as strategies for connecting brand purpose with customer purpose. Product and service innovation will focus on resilient and regenerative business models that are proving to be financially successful. Distinguished faculty and program highlights include:

  • GlobeScan, SustainAbility and Sustainable Brands will present results of new joint research projects surveying the ‘landscape of purpose’ in terms of both consumer preferences and business leaders’ perceptions of achievement and gaps in sustainability actions by the private sector, NGOs and governments.
  • IKEADONG EnergyStora EnsoMarimekko and others will share how they have gone about pivoting their business models and innovation pipelines in the direction of future-proof products and services aligned with sustainability-inspired brand positioning.
  • John Elkington (Volans), The Future-Fit FoundationBASF, Novozymes and others will bring up-to-the-minute insights on aligning the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) with brand strategy, product and service innovation, employee engagement, and corporate sustainability goal-setting. 
  • HEINEKENL’OréalSprout and Arla Foods will be among the brands sharing how they conceived and implemented successful advertising campaigns aligned with a higher-order purpose inspired by social and environmental priorities.
  • Novozymes, adidas and others will dive deep into the value chain of textiles with the goal of having a co-creative series of discussions that highlight best-practice breakthrough innovation and consumer engagement along the entire value chain, pointing out a number of successful case studies along the way.

Sustainable Brands is proud to recognize Novozymes as Platinum sponsor for SB’16 Copenhagen. Silver level sponsors include: thinkstep, BASF, DONG Energy, Thailand Sustainable Development Foundation and Quantis. Additional sponsors and partners include: Carlson Rezidor Hotel Group, Guardian Sustainable Business, Blue Practice, 3BL Media, CSRWire, SustainAbility, GreenBlue among others. Nature Bank is the official carbon offset partner and South Pole Group is the official renewable energy partner.

Sponsor and partner opportunities are still available for companies with breakthrough ideas, tools and technologies that support business success in sustainability. Contact Jonathan Reese at 1+ 415.626.2212 for sponsorship opportunities.

Further information, including an initial list of speakers and sponsors, a downloadable brochure and conference schedule for the September 26-28 event at the Radisson Blu Scandinavia Hotel in Copenhagen, Denmark, can be found at www.SB16cph.com.  

About Sustainable Brands

Sustainable Brands® is the premier global community of brand innovators who are shaping the future of commerce worldwide. Since 2006, our mission has been to inspire, engage and equip today’s business and brand leaders to prosper for the near and long term by leading the way to a better future. Digitally published news articles and issues-focused conversation topics, internationally known conferences and regional events, a robust e-learning library and peer-to-peer membership groups all facilitate community learning and engagement throughout the year. Sustainable Brands is a division of Sustainable Life Media, headquartered in San Francisco, CA.