Black Friday and Sustainability

Today is Tuesday,which means I successfully survived Black Friday and Cyber Monday without buying things that I don’t need. But let’s talk about Black Friday and sustainability. In the past few years the hype around Black Friday got bigger and bigger. Every shop tries to offer something better and bigger than last year. They extend their sales to the whole weekend or even the week after, and of course we’ve got Cyber Monday.

Black Friday is not sustainable at all. It encourages people to consume regardless of need. It is easy to end up buying things which don’t provide real value. This mindset have consequences for the environment. Think about all the packaging and shipping. That means we create more waste and more fuel is burnt because of the shipping. And most of the products have poor quality so they are likely to end up on landfill a couple months after buying them.

I follow a lot of eco-friendly and sustainable brands on social media so I could see what kind of offers they had for this occasion. It got me thinking, is it really sustainable to have these crazy offers as a sustainable brand?

Sustainable brands are known to be more expensive than others so not everyone can afford them on the first place. If you really need something but you are on a budget, a sale this big can come in handy. But on the other hand, shouldn't sustainable brands support sustainability? If a company labels itself as sustainable, doing a Black Friday sale doesn’t seem right for me. Black Friday is everything, but sustainable. Encouraging people to buy more and more stuff is not sustainable.

I understand that Black Friday sales are important, especially for small brands or startups. But I also think that a sustainable company shouldn’t encourage people to buy more. I saw a handful of brands, who didn’t have special offers because as they said, it doesn’t align with their values. I also saw Green Friday offers which focus on giving back to nature and had projects like planting trees. We need more brands like these! In the past year sustainability and the environmental impact of over consumption was in focus. People genuinely care about these issues and there’s a demand for sustainable brands. These brands have power. These brands have the power to change how consumers think. They can offer alternatives which don’t have such a huge environmental impact. They can change the narrative.

I hope next year I will see even more sustainable brands stand up for their values and say no to Black Friday.

Cheers,

K