The Power of Ethical Shopping
Ethical Consumerism and its True Potential
As a consumer amidst the current trend of flooded markets and such competition, it has become normal to purchase purely on convenience and price point without an in depth knowledge of the impact purchasing habits can actually have.
Our world is seemingly run by big multinational corporations when it is actually the individuals that should feel empowered. Consumerism tends to drive decision making in the corporate world. With socially and environmentally conscious purchasing trends, the power shift is with society to make a real difference in the world.
The growing demand for corporate transparency and underlying knowledge of business practice has opened up a powerful potential in ethical consumerism.
To ponder a perfect world, where the entire supply chain process of a business fully incorporates the upholding of human rights and the environment's longevity and sustainability, it becomes apparent how influential each product and sale on the market actually is.
The true cost of what we buy, from day to day goods to foods and clothes, stems from a long line of impacts, with little legislation in place to ensure minimization of this. From the most optimistic point of view, there is a simplistic solution. Corporations and consumers alike begin to diminish the demand for unsustainable products, and that consumerism's normality becomes ethical centric.
This fundamentally needs to be expressed through the empowerment of global citizens. It is easy to feel insignificant in a world of 7.4 billion people. However, the collective impact potential we have is far superior to that of any corporation.
When you find yourself trying to impact the betterment of society or our environment, think about how easy it can be to change your buying habits as the first point of action.
As you think about the superpowers in the fashion industry's realm all the way through to supermarkets, they are only powerful because of their demand from consumers such as yourself and the sheer quantities of purchases they gain.
If we all took a moral standpoint and ceased to shop at large chains that may not follow an ethical practice, their business would either be forced to implement a system following the trend, i.e., environmental protocols or better worker's rights, or they would lose income to the degree that their business would no longer be viable.
It's as simple as that. This is where clarity of corporate operations and supply chain is necessary to ensure that the option is there to empower individual consumers to make purchasing decisions based on something more than convenience and price point.
At Uppercup, we work hard to be as sustainable and ethical in how we work as possible. This is one of the reasons we worked to become a B Corp. This was the next step for us after having the Australian Made certification. Companies such as ours and Keep Cup work to create a more sustainable future and support Zero waste living one step at a time.
Consumerism is such a powerful tool for everyone to feel like a stakeholder in the planet and the actions made along a line of impacts that produce the goods we all live-by. Next time you are shopping for anything, take a moment to think about how your purchase actually might influence and, most importantly, feel empowered to make decisions about purchases based on a socially and environmentally conscious standpoint.
