What Actually Forces Companies to Protect the Ocean?

0:00 What does it actually take for a company to stop harming the Ocean? Because despite all the promises, sustainability reports, and polished marketing campaigns, most companies do not change just because people care. They change when we hit a tipping point. This is the How to Protect the Ocean Podcast, your weekday Ocean news update. If you care about staying informed about the Ocean every weekday, hit that follow button right now so you don't miss tomorrow's story, which we're gonna be talking to Sarah Federman. It's gonna be a lot of fun. We're gonna be talking about all the stuff that we talked about today. I've mentioned to her in a bunch of these episodes. It's all about Ocean Week today. We are talking about all the real reasons companies change, why awareness alone is not enough, and what actually works if you want to protect the Ocean.

0:45 Now, a lot of us grow up believing that if companies knew the damage they were causing, they would do the right thing. That's a very scientific way of thinking. And what I mean by that, I don't mean any harm or disrespect, is like when scientists are taught how to communicate. We are taught to communicate by logic. Everything we do is math based. Everything we do is logic based. So when we're doing a study, we're trying to look for a trend, we use math to find it. It's either yes or no, or we make a hypothesis. Is our hypothesis falsified? Like does it actually work out or not? What happens, we get a result and we communicate it in a scientific publication that's peer reviewed by a number of editors and we go back and forth. And once it's published, it's published to a community, a community of academics where logic feeds on logic.

1:27 So we go to the brain, as Randy Olson says with his book Don't be such a Scientist. Scientists feed to the brain. We talk to the brain. That's what we love to do. 'Cause if we say, Hey, you know what? Climate change is happening and we need to lower our climate open, our greenhouse gases, then people should change, right? Yeah. It doesn't work all that way. We have to hit people in the emotional gut. Where they're happy, sad, crying, angry, whatever that might be, you need to hit them there. You need to hit 'em emotionally. That's the Science Communication 101 from Randy Olson. And so when we talk about logic, we say, Hey, you know what? If businesses knew their packaging was polluting beaches, they would probably stop. That's what we're thinking. That's the scientific way of thinking. The logical way of thinking. If the businesses knew supply chains were harming communities, they would fix it.

2:11 If they knew emissions were harming the Ocean, they would act. But history shows us that that is not how change usually happens. Most organizations are built to preserve momentum. They protect quarterly profits, existing systems, investor confidence, all that mumbo jumbo. It's whatever's convenient to make the most money. Even good people inside those companies often work within the systems designed to resist the change. That does not mean change is impossible. It means change needs pressure. I think it's really important when we start to say things publicly but we move slowly privately. A lot of times, like you look at something like Starbucks. I always use Starbucks as an example 'cause it's a perfect example.

2:51 When Starbucks first came out, it was the ethical brand. Not only did they show that coffee can be hoi toi. You could feel great about yourself. You're paying more for coffee. It's a different experience and not just in a local coffee shop. You are in some, like an establishment that serves coffee and it serves great coffee and that's what you want. So you go after. But when they first came out, they were also all about the environment. They had it in their values. And then all of a sudden they took it up. At first when they had their values and they wanted to reduce their impact on the environment, they were talking about moving away from plastic and all this kinda stuff. And then all of a sudden they took it out. Because it was gonna affect their bottom line. And it doesn't necessarily mean, and now they're fully plastic, like they said, or they came out, it was like, oh yeah, we don't like plastic straws.

3:32 We're not gonna have plastic straws. We're gonna make a top that's plastic and we're gonna serve that. And that continues. And it's really hard to recycle. So that's not fun. That's not fun at all. That's not what we need. And according to the interview where we talked to Sarah Federman, companies reach tipping points in different ways. Sometimes they start losing business. Sometimes public pressure becomes too visible to ignore. You see campaigns all the time where people are like, I don't like this business 'cause they didn't treat me well. Or, I don't like this business because it's not ethical, or, I don't like this business. And they come up with evidence and people like it. And sometimes there's a movement behind it. Sometimes someone from inside the company has a moral awakening and they start to reveal what's happening. Sometimes a personal moment changes everything. You see it all the time. But that is important because it means that there is no single magical tactic.

4:17 Different companies respond to different pressure points, and sometimes companies don't respond to anything. It all depends on the environment they're surrounded. But some care about reputation, some care about revenue, some care about the regulation. Some care when employees starts pushing internally. Some only move when the next generation asks hard questions. Cause sometimes like what we think is normal in generation, like I'm Generation X. Sometimes what we think is normal. The millennials and Gen Z start pushing back and be like, Hey, you know what? Actually that's not very good. We should be asking for better. And environmental movement is key to that. The key is figuring out what matters most to those companies. Let's talk about Patagonia as an example. Patagonia became known for shifting its mission beyond selling clothing.

5:00 The company openly acknowledged that business cannot thrive on a damaged planet. That's a huge mindset shift. Instead of asking, how do we grow no matter what, the question became, how do we operate in service of something bigger? Not every company will be Patagonia. We know that for sure. Let's be realistic. But it proves that business models can evolve when leadership decides purpose is not separate from profit. The B Corps is a huge program, B corporations that really measure on employees, on social and environmental change. It's an audit that companies go through. They pay to go through this audit because it's important to their values. They may sell anything.

5:40 I have one guy that I had on the podcast who was an insurance salesman. He owned an insurance brokerage, but he went through the B Corp process 'cause he wanted to be on it 'cause he wanted his values and the people that work there want to go through and want to have an ethical company, not only from a social standpoint, but also from an environmental standpoint. And he sells insurance. It's not an environmental brand. He sells insurance. His team building was to go out and help rebuild salmon and habitat. That's pretty cool. But it doesn't necessarily mean that you have to be an environmental company. It doesn't mean that your product has to benefit the environment right directly. Your values can benefit. I think that's an important point. Let's look, got another case study like innovation from necessity. Another example that we talked with Sarah Wi Jo Hill tomorrow was a carpet tile company facing the loss of a client because of environmental concerns.

6:26 That threat created urgency, like the company changed materials, rethought its design and it innovated because staying the same became more expensive than changing. That's what they cared about. That is the lesson many Ocean advocates miss. We often ask companies to change because it is right, but many change when it becomes necessary. So if you are a buyer, a company that buys say, these tiles, well, you're not gonna buy it from this tile company because they don't use the right tiles because they're not sustainable. They're actually bad for the environment. Well, they're not gonna change because, oh, yeah, well, they're bad for the environment. They're gonna change because they're losing business. I think that's an important part of looking at how we can be environmentally friendly. Necessary can mean financial risk.

7:07 Necessary can mean customer loss. Necessary can mean legal exposure. It could also mean talent refusing to work there because of bad environmental practices. It could mean public trust collapsing. It could mean a number of different things. I think it's interesting when people boycott. Like one person quietly switching brands. It'll rarely change a multinational corporation. Like if you drink Coke and you all of a sudden you find out Coke is very bad for water practices and you go to Pepsi. They're not gonna notice one person just changing. That's just the reality of the situation. But a coordinated pressure can do make a difference. So like if thousands, if not millions of customers leave and tell the company why, that matters.

7:48 If investors ask questions, that matters. If media covers the issue, that also matters. If employees organize internally, or even if regulators respond, they all matter. It just depends on what you, as one of those types of people decide what to do with your money, with where you consume things, with where you purchase things, and how you're gonna purchase things. Like the individual access is not useless. It becomes powerful when connected to others. And we talked about that on Monday's episode. It is true for everything. It's true for plastic pollution, seafood sourcing, destructive coastal development, and even Ocean climate policy. I think people need to really understand that adding pressure to a company can change their behavior.

8:36 There aren't many examples I can think of off the top of my head other than the one that we talked about with this tile company where a tile company changed their practices, what tiles they use because the purchaser wants something more environmentally friendly. There was one guy I interviewed. He created an environmentally friendly cement that you can put underwater and you can build reefs off of it in restoration projects that are happening everywhere. They're happening all around the world. But that doesn't happen because like when people are just buying regular concrete and putting in the water and then they're like, well this doesn't really work. Or people are like, why would you buy that when you have this other environmentally friendly concrete that's made in a better way and it's better for the reefs when we rebuild. Why would I buy this bad one when I can buy this one that works just as well?

9:16 People coming up with these types of innovations really help. If a company is harming the Ocean, ask yourself like, what is their tipping point? Is it customer trust? Is it brand image? Is it losing contracts? Is it recruiting talent? Maybe the regulation. Is it pressure from investors or shareholders? Once you know that, your advocacy becomes smarter. That's what a lot of these organizations are looking for. They're getting inside the businesses. They're getting inside, like what happens against inside their head, like what matters most to them. So instead of just saying, Hey, you need to do better, you gotta target the thing that actually moves 'em, that actually matters to them. This is how you beat frustration. That's the strategy. You gotta look at what matters most. So here are three practical moves you can do today.

9:57 You can be specific. You can tell companies exactly what you want changed. You can do it as a collective, like be collective. Join campaigns, organizations, or community efforts instead of acting alone. And you can be persistent. One message may be ignored. But if you sustain pressure, that changes the timeline, especially if you do it in a collective voice. You don't need to be louder. You need to be more strategic. You need to think like a notion organization, like a nonprofit organization and like an advocacy organization. So companies don't change usually because they suddenly care. That's made in the movies. They change when enough people, enough pressure, enough risk, and/or enough vision or all of those makes staying the same, impossible.

10:39 And when that moment comes, everything can change fast. Like it could come from the billionaire who made money off of Patagonia is all of a sudden saying, Hey, you know what? The way we make clothes is really wasteful. We need to change our practices. We need to give all of our profits from now on to someone else 'cause I've made enough money. We've all made enough money. So the question is not whether change is actually possible. The question is how do we help create the tipping point for businesses to make that change? I would love to hear your thoughts on this. You can hit me up on Speak Up for blue.com/feedback. I'd love to hear either voicemail or you can type in your information. I'd love to get back to you 'cause this is the start of a conversation. I am trying to inspire you to think about what change looks like and how we can protect our planet during this Earth Week.

11:22 Because right now there are thousands of people who are gathering in a conference room at EARTHx to talk about this as businesses, individuals, nonprofit organizations, for-profit organizations, projects, academics. They're all gathering and trying to figure out, what's everybody's tipping point? How are we gonna change this thing? How are we gonna help the earth? How are we gonna help the planet? How are we gonna fight against like these government rollbacks? How are we gonna build leaders for the future to make sure that these government rollbacks never happen again and we make these regulations stronger so that they can't be changed. It's not just by executive order of a president or a prime minister or whoever. How do we make sure that environment is on the tip of everybody's tongues and on their minds? ' cause that's what's really important.

12:02 That's what people are doing at EARTHx. I want you to do the same thing after you listen to this or while you're listening to this podcast, and I'd love to hear about it 'cause this is the start of a conversation I would love for you to continue it back at me 'cause that's why I started this podcast in the first place. And this is the How To Protect the Ocean Podcast. And I'm your host Andrew Lewin. I wanna thank you so much for joining us today. Have a great day. Can't wait to hear from you and happy conservation.