The Market Shift

Sustainability Is Becoming a Growth Strategy.
The market is already rewarding it.

Sustainability-marketed products are capturing a disproportionate share of CPG growth — creating a significant opportunity for brands that can turn credible sustainability impact into customer value, competitive differentiation, and revenue growth.

A light bulb with plants growing out of it.

44.9%

of CPG growth
2013–2025

25.4%

of branded CPG
market share

4.9×

faster growth than
conventional products

10.9% vs. 2.2%

five-year CAGR

68%

of consumers surveyed struggled to identify the lower-carbon option between two products.

For brands, the opportunity is no longer simply to market sustainability. It is to turn credible sustainability impact into customer value and business growth.

Source: NYU Stern Center for Sustainable Business / Circana, 2025 Sustainable Market Share Index. Analysis of 36 U.S. CPG categories representing approximately 40% of the U.S. CPG market.

A man made out of trees looking at his tablet.

The Customer Shift

Your Customers Are Already Driving the Shift.
They aren’t just buying sustainable products. They’re increasingly expecting brands to explain, substantiate, and demonstrate the impact behind them.

75%

of Millennials expect brands to provide environmental-impact information — 47% proactively and another 28% when asked.

64%

of Gen Z shoppers have skipped a purchase because a sustainability claim felt unclear or hard to believe.

50%

of Gen Z says its interest in recommerce has increased, while 31% expect brands to provide resale options.

90% / 85%

of Gen Z / Millennials reported purchasing sustainable products.

The brands that can make sustainability visible, credible and meaningful to customers have an opportunity to turn an existing consumer expectation into competitive advantage.

Sources: Akeneo PX Pulse Survey, 2026; ALPLA 2026 Packaging Claims Reality Check Report; Capterra Consumer Sustainability Expectations Survey, 2022.

The Missed Opportunity

The Opportunity Most Brands Are Missing
Brands are investing in sustainability. Consumers increasingly care about it. Yet much of the value created by those efforts never reaches the customer in a meaningful way.

Make sustainability impact visible. Brands may have meaningful environmental data, but it often remains buried in reports, product pages or corporate sustainability communications rather than becoming part of the customer experience.

Make sustainability credible. Consumers are increasingly skeptical of broad claims without clear, understandable evidence behind them.
Connect sustainability to customer engagement. Environmental impact is often measured separately from marketing, ecommerce and customer engagement — leaving value on the table.
Turn impact into customer value. Sustainability can strengthen trust, differentiation, retention and purchasing, but most brands lack a way to connect their actual environmental impact to those business outcomes.

Old computers with plants growing out of them and a fish tank inside.

Extend the relationship beyond the transaction. Most sustainability communication happens before or at purchase, leaving a powerful post-purchase opportunity to reinforce the customer’s decision, demonstrate impact, and inspire continued engagement.

Your brand may be doing more for the planet than your customers ever see, understand or experience.

The Planet Cents Solution

A Sustainable Retailer’s Verified Impact for Sustainable Revenue

**Deliver verified environmental impact at the moment it matters most — after purchase —
turning sustainability impact into customer engagement, loyalty, sharing, nonprofit benefit, and measurable growth.**

Planet Cents transforms a customer’s purchase into a personalized, shareable sustainability experience by showing the measurable environmental impact of what they bought.

Instead of letting sustainability impact disappear into a report, website or corporate sustainability page, brands can bring that impact directly to the customer — turning what the brand has accomplished into something the customer can see, understand and share.

Brands then offer a brand-selected giving component, that comes up after the sustainability metrics. Customers then share a photo of their purchase, along with its environmental data on their social channels. For each share, the brand donates an amount of money to that nonprofit. Customers win. The brand wins. The nonprofit wins.