Written by Marieke Hammes - Sustainability & Operations Manager

It's been 6 months since we were accepted into Positive Luxury's Accelerator Programme already! I am really proud of Canned Wine Co. being chosen, the work we are doing and we have not talked about it enough... this blog post is here to change that.  

What is Positive Luxury? 

Positive Luxury works with luxury brands to redefine business models for a sustainable future through an ESG+ assessment and awards the Butterfly Mark certification when scoring over 50% in each area of ESG. The process is supported by risk and opportunity mapping, coaching and communication tools.  

The Butterfly Mark was built on the foundation of global frameworks and standards, including BSI, University of Cambridge's Institute for Sustainability Leadership, Stanford University, Forum for the Future and Volans. The rigorous assessment looks at: 

• Impact on climate, nature and water (Environment) 
• How we treat workers and communities (Social) 
• How responsibly and ethically we run our business (Governance) 
• Innovative products, methodologies and technologies that also improve sustainability performance (+) 

The Butterfly Mark has been developed to communicate authentically with consumers who want to affect positive change and guide them towards brands meeting high standards and taking serious positive action. To support this, Positive Luxury has created the Connected Butterfly Mark Technology to allow brands to demonstrate their ESG+ scores, other certificates and best practices electronically to consumers.  

The Butterfly Accelerator Programme 

This accelerator programme supports 20 start-ups each year to provide 12 months of tailored support to help scale sustainably without the financial burden of certification and consulting fees. The membership cycle is based on a baseline assessment, risk mapping, final assessment, certification, future-proofing and re-assessment after two years.

We were thrilled to be accepted into the Q1 2023 programme alongside Koraru, Eight Lands and Clos L'Abbé! 

How has this helped Canned Wine Co.? 

There are various tangible benefits from being part of the Butterfly Accelerator Programme: 

• 25 hours of support free of charge – more traditional consulting fees in this area can be really prohibitive 
• Policy templates and guidelines 
• Marketing library and communication toolkits 
• Workshops and community events 
• Risk map derived from our baseline assessment with improvement suggestions for every data point 

Additionally, as Sustainability & Operations Manager in charge of the certification process, I've found it hugely helpful to have someone external keeping me on track and accountable – shoutout to Sara! We are now also part of a wonderful community of brands that inspire me to do better and rethink our operations.  

Canned Wine Co.'s Progress 

• Submitted the baseline assessment in July 2023 after going through every question and gathering evidence 
• Reviewed the baseline performance report and risk map with the PL team in August 2023. This showed a preliminary score of 47% (average for baseline assessment is usually 36%). A lack of evidence despite good intentions suppressed some of our scores, exemplifying that most work is needed on improving our data collection to be able to assess our impact better. As a start-up, there are trade-offs between wanting to take immediate action and spending the time and resources it requires for accurate data collection. Being part of the Accelerator Programme is helping us identify different ways of improving our measurement and reporting.  
• Utilised the recommendations from the risk map report to inform our new Sustainability Roadmap (...almost ready to publish!)
• Next submission with improvements is planned for November 2023 

Even if we reach over 50% in our next submission and thereby qualify for the Butterfly Mark, I don't want to stop there. We will be part of the Accelerator Programme until spring 2024, giving us the unique opportunity to continue learning from the Positive Luxury team and their community of brands and keep growing our sustainability ambitions.  

Find out more