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Tim Brown, Co-founder and Chief Innovation Officer, Allbirds Interviewer: Molly Wood, Molly Wood Media

Impact Initiative 2023: The Path To A Truly Circular Company

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After a successful Kickstarter campaign in 2016, all boards launched and quickly became a certified B corporation. Three years ago, they partnered with Adidas to make their first iteration of a low carbon shoe. And in June of this year has announced they've created the world's first net zero carbon shoe here to discuss their Moonshot shoe. Please welcome Albert's co founder and Chief Innovation Officer, Tim Brown. He'll be interviewed by Impact Initiative co chair Molly Wood. Hello again. Thanks so much for joining me, Tim. Thank you for having me. We are going, don't worry, there are photos of the shoe coming shortly in case you haven't seen it. But um I, I want to jump in by asking you about this focus for you as a company and why carbon and why make this attempt at a carbon negative sho Sure. Uh So was founded with the idea that for 50 years, uh we've been making things out of plastic and synthetic materials and there was an opportunity uh in natural materials. Uh We were anchored in the idea that sustainability was our purpose, but what the hell does that mean? Uh And so we started uh anchored in this material innovation and quickly realized that our North Star was carbon uh sustainability. Part of the problem is that word has been pushed and pulled so much to almost be meaningless at this point. Uh And we were able to anchor on the idea that carbon could be our North Star in the way that we created products. So in the same way that calories go on food, we started to label the products that we made with the kilograms of carbon that were emitted in their production. And that was really the beginning of our, of our carbon journey. And all of a sudden, our designers and creators were putting products out into the world and they had effectively uh like a tin of baked beans, uh a score on them. So that was the starting point just out of curiosity, carbon as opposed to what as a well, I mean, I think sustainability means 100 different things. It's about air quality, water quality, animal welfare, biodegradability. And before long, you're not getting out of bed in the morning. It's so confusing, often times with competing incentives and really what you're trying to do is make a pair of shoes. So uh carbon became the focus in the same way that calories isn't the totality of a healthy diet. It's a very, very important North Star unifying metric and that allows us to compare different food groups uh in different places around the world in a consistent way. So the same thing we believe is going to be the future of how we evaluate the products and services that we use and every day. Um And so the result of that and we'll talk about some of the journey, but the result of that at least now is the Moonshot shoe, um, which I think looks like a cozy sweater. Let's have a look. We have some pictures here. Here it is the, is this the, this is the world's first carbon negative shoe as I understand it. Yes. Yeah. Right. And cozy sweater. Do you see it? Do you see it? So, our designers and creators and makers all of a sudden uh their work is effectively getting scored when it goes out into the world. Uh We did a partnership with Adidas uh that landed on a shoe that we released a couple of years ago at 2.94 kg of carbon, about half a hamburger. And our team was like, ok, as we look across the carbon footprint of the product, uh where are the opportunities to go even lower? Um And we were able to, with a partnership with our growing network, New Zealand Merino. Uh we were able to start to measure the out the gate carbon impact of the fiber that we were using realized through regenerative practices. Those numbers were low and in some cases negative. And there was a possibility if you designed and engineered every aspect of the product uh to make uh to make a shoe without offsets. That was uh net 00 My gosh, all of a sudden, this is really, really interesting. Um And the most fervent adopters of this particular methodology uh wasn't the sustainability department, it was the designers and creators that all of a sudden realized this was the path forward. This is the way that we were going to uh to, to continue to be able to talk about objects of desire in the same breath that we talk about sustainability. And this again seems enabled by this focus on a very specific one metric. Like it seems like the magic of what you've done here is create one metric and work toward that metric. The focus is really important. Um Five big buckets within a carbon footprint, the materials, the manufacturing, the transport, the packaging and the end of life all of a sudden, OK. I need to really, really look at every decimal point here. Uh And this is a game of ventures and actually you can, you can make really meaningful impact if you connect the dots here. Uh And that's been our journey. Um And it started really with this connection uh with the growers. So our uh we source wool from the New Zealand Merino Network. It's uh it's about 700 farms in New Zealand, slightly biased but very, I think the most beautiful corner of the world Uh And for the better part of a generation, no one in New Zealand's uh been growing up wanting to be a farmer. In fact, politically, they've been held up as the enemy of the environment, but we're able to partner with this growing network. Tell them that we will pay more for this fiber. Uh And that if it's properly measured, uh that there is uh some incredible opportunities to provide uh low carbon or even negative carbon fiber. Uh And in 24 months, almost 700 of those farms have signed up. Uh And it's an incredible example. I think of this moving quite quickly when you connect the spirit uh of innovation and economic opportunity to the idea of uh of, of making products and doing it now. So it's been an incredibly important thing for us, the other thing you did and I, I do want to give you an opportunity to ask questions. So think of your questions, put your hand up and a runner will come to you. Um One of the things though that I think you did it, that's really interesting is, is effectively open source, this tool kit sort of issue, this challenge to the rest of the um footwear community. I mean, is it specifically about building shoes or are you trying to sort of inspire carbon negative goods? So we've had some success through our history, open sourcing the materials that we use uh with the idea that that could serve our purpose. Uh And the more when we bring an innovation to market, the more people that use it, the more impact uh that we can have. But also with scale the cost come down and we're able to negotiate terms with our suppliers to make that happen. And in the case of Moonshot, again, that open source spirit has been there, the more people that adopt uh an understanding of carbon and an appreciation of, of the ability uh to use this framework to uh make better products with lower impact, the better that will be for everyone, but also for us because we believe we're doing it uh as good, if not better than, than anyone else. Um And also this is the future of how I think we're going to buy and consume. So um that mentality is, is at the core of how we build the business. And so this was uh released as an open source tool kit. Uh It's incredible, the number of people that have, have reached out uh big and small to, to use it. I think I'm yet to meet someone in the fashion industry that doesn't want to work this out. Uh often times the barriers to entry uh and an understanding of how to do that in a complicated economic environment. Um necessitates that we work together and we share. So we're trying to show leadership in that area. Wait, so I want to put a slightly finer point on that. It sounds like it's both altruistic and selfish. Because if you can get people to adopt these methodologies, you, you get past the kind of adoption gap more quickly, you get better economies of scale faster. I I think you, you can't look at this altruistically. You have to look at uh the opportunity to drive your purpose. But also for opportunities for economic economic gain, do not get into a conversation with a farmer and mention the term regenerative agriculture because they will and this has happened to me, they'll boo at you and they won't want to talk uh talk to them about economic opportunity and talk to them about the, the uh the grandchildren boun bouncing on their knee who uh has is counting the days before they can get off the property and tell them actually, no, this is, this is shifting back in your favor. Uh These kids are gonna want to come back and they're gonna see agriculture not as, as a, a historical part of New Zealand and uh but actually part of the future and that's what's happening. And so it's incredibly exciting and the language and the way that we talk about this is as important as the science that underpins it. Are there questions in the audience yet? No. OK. Oh Alan has one. Thank you. Uh You talked about the five big buckets uh materials manufacturing transport. I forgot what the last two were but, but I got hung up on the third. How do you get the carbon out of the transportation system that you have to use to deliver these issues? Well, look, it's, it's, it's, it's all about looking at this, at scale for us uh in really, really simple terms, air sea shipping and then within the, you know, get this on a boat. Uh and then within the, the sea shipping space at scale biofuels are coming into, into that space and you're able to um aggregate this. And relatively speaking, it's a tiny part of the overall carbon footprint of a pair of shoes that you put on. Generally speaking, we find that about half the number is in the materials a third give or take or even more is in the manufacturing. So it's a relatively small part of the overall carbon uh carbon number that, that constitutes the the final score on the product so that I had a similar question. So the carbon negative determination is inclusive. It's a life cycle and with, it's within, it's within the uh no offsets, it's within the calculation of the product. Uh And it's largely in, in our case driven by the uh the carbon negative merino wool. So wool is a little bit like saying cars, there's a lot of variants. Uh We're now understanding that technology can applied to measure out the gate scores for each property and each property is very different depending on how it's farmed, the cover crops, the, the nuances of the topography in each particular case, once we start to understand that which we are beginning to do, uh you can then incentivize the farmers, uh you can get truly accurate numbers and all of a sudden, uh the playing field is, is a little fairer in terms of the impact of the product at the end of the day. Um So the wool is that negative that it actually it, it serves as an accidental. It's one part of it. Yeah, you've got to look at every part of it. You know, there's a series of other carbon negative materials within, within the product. And then you've got to look at the packaging, you've got to look at every aspect of how, you know, uh of how it's put together. But it is possible. And I think that's exciting. We uh we went to the Global Fashion Summit in Copenhagen to release this product. Uh the preeminent event in the fashion industry. Uh And it was, it was notable for three things. No CEO S were there. Um None of the supplying network, the people that actually make stuff. Uh And no one showed up with an actual object. We spent a lot of time talking about 2050 which is really important. Don't get me wrong. But what are we doing right now? Uh And is the leadership of the business uh there and involved? And are we connecting um that business strategy and that feeling that we have that this is important to the consumer. And I think uh otherwise the criticism would be, there's a lot of people at Copenhagen and possibly even at this event, they are in the business of risk mitigation and the sustainability department is there to, to not get anyone in trouble. And I don't think that's where we need to be. Um I think that we need to think about sustainability as innovation about creativity and we need to balance the, the future with what we can do immediately. And right now and then finally it to that storytelling piece is this why consumers are buying all birds. And August 1 analyst suggested consumers are maybe not as excited about carbon negative uh shoes and said there were slowing sales at all bids. Is that why they're buying or not buying? Do you think a surefire way to not have someone meet you for a beer on a Friday night? Is to say that you want to talk about uh sustainability? That's when your friend will, will run. We, I mean, I will have that beer. You and I, you and I just uh you know, uh people don't buy sustainable products, they buy great ones. I don't think that uh any product or service can lay claim or business can lay claim to being great in this moment in time unless they are thinking deeply about sustainability and the principles of how it applies to their business. Um But let's, let's not get uh put the cart before the horse. You need to make great products, great experiences and you got to look for opportunities where purpose and profit intersect and where great consumer experiences and great product experiences uh can leverage sustainable uh opportunities. That's where we'll move this thing forward. And uh and I'm, I'm incredibly excited. I, I think there's a little bit of a lag between what people feel and what they believe and what's happening. Uh I'm, I'm excited for where we are. Great Tim Brown Ceo of all. Thank you so much. Thank you so much. Appreciate it.

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