Green Entrepreneurs Assemble—The newsletter for green entrepreneurs and professionals.

A rising tide lifts all boats 🙂 

Hi, I am Akhoy, all the way from North-eastern India.

I put in 100s of hours every month to reach out and interview business people around the world, who are working towards creating a more sustainable future for the planet. Some of them are just starting, while others are generating millions in revenue. There are invaluable lessons you can learn from people at different stages of growing green businesses.

I live in a biodiversity hotspot myself that is undergoing rapid urbanization and deforestation (these two are BFF, to be honest). I understand the importance of successfully monetizing activities that are meant to protect the earth’s ecosystems.

Interestingly, there is very little first-hand content online on green entrepreneurship, which is why I decided to create this newsletter.

Podcasts demand a good deal of time to listen to, but the written format is easier to consume. I have also highlighted important words and phrases to make each interview a quick read.

Without further ado, let’s welcome today’s guest—

Table of Contents

1. Backstory

2. 3D Framework

3. Business Model

4. Venture Studio

5. Validating Sustainable Business Models

6. Mode of Working

7. Funding

8. Client Types

9. Team Members

10. Biggest Success and Challenge

11. Future Plans

12. Collaborate with Leo

13. "1 Minute Summary" of the Interview

(Note: I have preserved Leo’s voice, but made slight edits for readability)

🟢Please tell me your backstory and how you started in this field.

I was working in the advertising and marketing industries for 20 years, but there was something not right in it. It was bothering me, and I decided I wanted to find a place to use my talents that was more useful than just selling any old shit.

So, I knew I wanted to get involved in accelerating the transition to a post-carbon world, but I didn't really know how. Then, I went on a Cambridge course, which is called CISL (Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership). It showed me the depth of the abyss and the challenge that we have on the transition and dealing with climate breakdown.

And so, then I decided that the skills that I have, which are in shaping behavior and changing aspirations, could be redeployed and re-pointed instead at different ways of consumption, lower impact consumption, even no consumption. How could we do that?

So, I built a company called EdenLab, and our whole mission is: How do we help consumers and people switch demand from high-intensity carbon and unsustainable products and services to lower or better ones? And how do we help companies do it?

The last, I'll say, is that we have this quite simple theory of change, which is—if companies can't make money doing the green, clean thing, they won't do it. And if they don't do it, you know, we're dead.

So, how do we help them commercialize sustainability? How do we help them make money green? That’s our mission. And we do it by helping them see what the future looks like.

We give them vision work for the future. We help them understand how ready they are for that future. And then we help them design the products and services in the marketing they need to switch demand. Simple as that.

🟢 So, that is your 3D framework?

The 3D Framework

• Diagnose the green growth opportunity

• Design green growth revenue programmes

• Deliver transition at scale

Effectively, yeah, it is that. And it changes a little bit from time to time, but that's the model we've been using. And we try and make it quantitative, but we also try and make it provocative and creative. We bring different talents together to try and inspire it.

Most of the people I find working in sustainability are often very focused on the problem now and fixing it. And they're often in a world of incremental change and dealing with lots and lots of complexity around reporting the size of the problem.

What they're less capable of doing is pitching a vision for how the future could be better or being creative and imaginative about what one might do to really break through.

And so, a lot of the work that we do is bringing some of those skills to that situation to open it up in fresh and new ways to enable innovation to happen. You know, I am quite pessimistic in many ways about the challenge that we have. Or maybe I am realistic.

I think it's really big and really hard. But I also know that if we spend our entire time looking backward and in a sort of doom mindset, we'll get nowhere.

So, we need to think forwards and kind of unleash human ingenuity somehow. That's my mission, really.

🟢What is the business model for EdenLab? Is it a consultancy?

Yeah, it's a consultancy. So, we're selling project work. But we're in the process of building a more repeatable and data-driven spine that sits beneath it.

So, we're just testing a new algorithm that we've developed with a young computer scientist at King's College in London. And that will allow us to very quickly assess how ready for green growth a company is in any sector.

So, we can assess how strong they are on core sustainability metrics. And then we can assess what I call the ‘supply side’. And we can also assess how well organized they are around the ‘demand side’.

Because I think there’s this really interesting thing happening in companies— companies will set a big corporate goal. Say, a dairy company will set a big corporate pledge to reduce methane.

But you can't, in most cases, you can't walk into the supermarket and buy that pledge.

You can't buy a low-methane yoghurt. And so the connection between what's happening in the background and what's happening actually in the real world of commercial reality is not there.

They're not connected. So, that's what I'm really trying to do— bridge that gap. And to do that you need data as well as just clever consultants.

🟢So, you are a venture studio too, right?

Yeah, and we're still exploring quite how that works and how we can make money in a business model sense. But we had this mission, which is: we make big companies more sustainable and sustainable companies bigger.

So, the ‘big companies more sustainable’ bit, you know, Danone, Unilever, Tube-the travel business, the Football Association in the UK etc. we help them. they're quite slow-moving. They have big impact, but they're quite slow-moving usually.

So, if you want to make an exponential change, I think you have to back interesting businesses, climate tech companies that have a promising proposition, that you think have a promising idea that you think can make a big difference.

So, we help them, and that can be coaching, can be mentoring, can be getting better at building their brand, getting their voice out there, help them get more investment.

That's where our venturing works at the moment. I think it might evolve in time to doing more funded inventions ourselves, but at the moment, it's not quite that.

🟢How do you validate sustainable business models?

We're sort of doing it two ways. One is at the outset, we have a bank of variables or questions that we ask of the customer or the client to understand if they have set clear targets? 

Have they demonstrated evidence that they seem to have a vision as a company, and they're putting it into practice or releasing results and being transparent about how well they're progressing towards those goals?

Do they have a business model that looks like it's more sustainable in design than the one proceeding?

So, and that varies—every vertical, every category, every company is different.

If you're looking at a dairy company, you'd be looking to understand how much regenerative agriculture is being used in the sourcing of the milk, for example.

If you're looking at a chemical company that makes detergent, for example, we'd be looking at what level of recyclable or recycled or renewable carbon is in the making of the product.

So, you can go quite deep on the business model side. But, like I said, for me, that's not enough. We also have to look at the demand side.

So, have you managed to come up with a sustainable value proposition that brings that to the customer? Have you got a customer experience platform in the way?

Are you actually nudging and educating the customer to make better and more sustainable choices? Are you communicating it in advertising and marketing in a way that isn't greenwash?

Those are some examples of some of the variables that we're using to make that assessment. And then, what we intend to do—and we haven't done enough of it, but I want to do more this year—is we put a new thing in place.

We put a program in place to drive the change, which could be a new product or service or a new way of working.

And then, you track both the commercial results, but also the decarbonization side. How much is being saved in carbon, so that you can begin to see a correlation between revenue performance and decarbonization? What we want to see is really smart ways of making money with less carbon being used.

High return on carbon type metrics is something I'm really interested in, but, you know, it's hard to do it, and I think we haven't done as much as we would like.

So, it's still a work in progress, I would say. I'm being very honest with you about that, rather than, you know, lying.

🟢How do you work with companies—is it a one-off project, or is it more like a continuous process?

It depends on the company. We try to do it as a more continuous process because the nature of transition is more like a three to five year kind of program, isn't it, really?

But sometimes they just want us to do a workshop about what will the world be like in 2040, and therefore what should they prepare?

So, it depends. It's primarily projects, but projects that are repeated over time. So, for example, two of our clients we've now been working with them for almost a year. The company's not that old, so in a way, that's a good sign.

🟢As a green entrepreneur, how did you fund your company, and how did you find your first clients?

I funded it myself, like from my savings. I was going to buy a house, and in the UK, when you buy a house, you have to pay the government tax. I didn't buy the house, and that tax money I'd saved, I put it into the company, which is a more fun thing to do.

So, that was the way we approached the financing so far, but I think we'll take more financing this year because we are growing, and I want to grow faster.

And how I found my first client… well, it's interesting, the first big client was Unilever, and I met someone from Unilever on my Cambridge course, and we got on, talked, and we chatted, and we became friendly.

And then she was good enough to offer me an opportunity to work with them. So, we did.

You know, really surprisingly simple looking back! (laughs)

Before you start, it looked terrifyingly hard. Just networking, you know, being helpful to people, being intelligent, being friendly, offering ideas, these kind of conversations, you know, just eventually things bubble up.

🟢So, you work with both large companies and also with new startups?

Yeah, mostly large because I know more about how to do that, but also the little ones.

There’s quite an interesting organization you could look into in the UK and Germany called Carbon 13.

They're like a venture builder, but they're really good as an aggregator of small companies trying to make these things happen in this space. And then, so I help with them sometimes, that's a way of meeting those companies.

🟢 How do your team members help you?

We have hired a range of different skills into the team - but all are dedicated to helping clients commercialise capability and find ways to switch demand to lower-intensity products.

So we have proposition designers, Customer experience strategists, media strategy, behaviour designers, business and innovation strategists, futurists etc all with sustainability expertise and passion.

🟢As an entrepreneur what has been your biggest challenge and biggest success so far?

Biggest success so far is creating a distinctive and valuable way to help businesses manage the transition successfully.

Biggest challenge is that there are still too many people who are trying not to see what’s happening to the world around them.

🟢What are your future plans for EdenLab?

Grow our impact by partnering further and wider and geographical expansion into the US and Asia too in time.

🟢 If you would like any of our readers to help you with anything, what would it be?

We want to reach more big companies to help them change.

Connect with Leo on Linkedin here: Leo Rayman | LinkedIn

Leo also runs an insightful newsletter on Substack that focuses on designing and building businesses that are better for both people and the planet— Leo Rayman | Substack

🟢 “1 Minute Summary” of the Interview

• Background and Motivation:

  • Leo worked in advertising and marketing for 20 years but felt the need to contribute to a more sustainable world.

  • He attended a Cambridge course on sustainability leadership, which deepened his understanding of climate challenges.

• EdenLab's Mission and Approach:

  • The company's mission is to commercialize sustainability by helping companies see the future and design products and services accordingly.

  • EdenLab employs a 3D framework: Diagnose the green growth opportunity, Design green growth revenue programs, and Deliver transition at scale.

• Business Model and Services:

  • EdenLab primarily operates as a consultancy, offering project-based work.

  • Additionally, they aim to function as a venture studio, supporting promising climate tech startups to drive exponential change.

• Validating Sustainable Business Models:

  • EdenLab evaluates companies based on various sustainability metrics and their ability to implement sustainable practices.

  • They focus on both the supply and demand sides of the business model to bridge the gap between corporate goals and consumer choices.

• First Client:

  • EdenLab's first client was Unilever, obtained through networking and building relationships.

• Funding:

  • Initially funded by Leo's personal savings, EdenLab plans to seek further financing to accelerate growth.

• Team and Expertise:

  • EdenLab's team consists of professionals with diverse skills, all dedicated to helping clients commercialize sustainability.

• Challenges and Successes:

  • Leo views creating a distinctive approach to helping businesses manage the transition as his biggest success.

  • The biggest challenge remains overcoming resistance to acknowledging and addressing environmental issues.

• Future Plans and Support Needed:

  • EdenLab seeks to partner with more big companies to drive change and expand its impact.

My book “Green Heroes: Vol 1” will be dropping soon :)