The Lush Summit in London was a celebration of their activist ethos, but it also turns out they have a thing or three to teach companies about business, and tech.

“You don’t seem to realize what business you’re in. You’re not in the burger business, you’re in the real estate business. You build an empire by owning the land. What you ought to be doing is owning the land upon which that burger is cooked.” Harry J. Sonneborn in The Founder (2016).

The Lush Summit 2018 was a slightly chaotic whirlwind of vegan doughnuts, argan oil and papier-mâché, but make no mistake the people at Lush know exactly what business they are in: activism.

As CDO Jack Constantine put it, “We are a company of activists who make cosmetics”.

Yes, this sounds like a carefully crafted PR line, but as it turns out it’s true. Every year, Lush donates hundreds of thousands of pounds towards a number of causes from close to home subjects such as animal testing to more far reaching concerns like ocean pollution and human rights campaigns.

The people at Lush know exactly what business they are in: activism
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Lush is a company of activists who make cosmetics
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For someone like myself, who has spent over a decade working in the comms industry, corporate social responsibility too often echoes the Monsanto-esque approach to sustainability campaigns: cue accomplished looking farmer peacefully walking back home at dusk after a wholesome day of work in the fields. If you find yourself in that uncomfortable place between the need to believe that a better way of doing business is possible and having to deal with a heavy dose of accumulated cynicism, Lush might just have something to lift up your spirits.

If you find yourself torn between jaded scepticism and the need to believe that a better way of doing business is actually possible, the Lush approach might be for you
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Lush’s concept, like most good ones, is simple: make fresh handmade products that people love. The ‘how’ they do it, is the interesting bit, though. From ingredient sourcing to how staff are treated, right through to their naked packaging policy, Lush operates with a relentless commitment to “do the right thing” all businesses should strive for. Let’s set the record straight before anyone gets flashbacks of hippies dancing around a fire, in 2016 Lush made £723 million in sales – an increase of 26% over the previous year. Not too shabby.

Lush’s concept is simple: make fresh handmade products that people love. The ‘how’ they do it, is the interesting bit
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Lush has plenty to teach businesses especially those in the tech space
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So, how do you make that kind of money while running a business with a heart? As I discovered, Lush has plenty to teach other businesses especially those in the tech space. Aside from the obvious fact that we all wash and use technology daily (well, most of us do anyway), Lush has a firmer handle on their digital ethics than their glittery products might lead you to believe.

Means to an end 

Make products with a mission, let your customers fall in love with both

In 2016 Lush launched The Digital Fund to support grassroot activists and charities protecting freedom of expression and safeguarding the Internet. The fund was financed by the sale of their Error 404 special edition bath bombs, which raised well over £200,000. Bahrain Watch, Digital Rights Watch in Australia and the Association for Technology and Internet in Romania are some of the associations that received funding so far.

In 2018 Lush is focusing on e-waste, the 20 million tons produced every year to be precise, with a new campaign built around a mobile-shaped Agbogbloshie bath bomb… the only phone you’ll ever willingly drop in water.

Lush is focusing on the 20 million tons of e-waste we produce every year
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DIY tech

If it’s not good enough make your own

Tech is everywhere nowadays, have you noticed? Hence it should come as no surprise that Lush employs a 40-strong team of software developers globally, who have built the company’s POS software. The surprising bit is that the software is completely open source, which means it’s technically available to their competitors too.

Lush employs a 40-strong team of software developers globally who have built the company’s open source POS software
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Lush is planning on rolling out their hardware, tablets for their retail locations to begin with, by the end of 2018
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To take this crafty endeavour one step further, Lush is planning on rolling out their hardware – tablets for their retail locations to begin with –  by the end of 2018. Let that sink in for a moment: a cosmetics company making their own ethically produced tech hardware.

“We have no plans to take over Apple any time soon” – jokes Constantine – “But we are serious about offering an ethical alternative to mainstream devices.”

End-to-end ethics

Dissect the entire lifecycle of tech

As the folks at Oxfam know all too well, your organisation is only as ethical as its weakest link. In other words, strong ethics are only as deep as a company’s knowledge of all the steps involved in the production of a product, and its willingness to “walk the walk.” Lush partners with a number of charities, associations and likeminded companies to bring its vision to life while avoiding cutting corners. Sharing moral standards with the people you do business with, finding the informed advisors and contributing by not being part of the problem are all important steps towards this.

Lush partners with a number of charities, associations and likeminded companies to bring its vision to life
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Two examples of such partnerships that stand out in the tech space are Ethical Consumer and Fairphone, who are both working with Lush to raise awareness around the sometimes shady tech supply chain. Whether it’s the dubious work ethics of invisible tech giant Foxconn – who subcontracts for the likes of Apple – or children mining cobalt in Congo, it seems high time for businesses to question the true cost of the tech they use or make.

It seems high time for businesses to question the true cost of the tech they use or make.
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So is Lush a dream company? Perhaps. Is it perfect? Of course not. However, with a reported pre-tax profit of £43.2m in FY 2015/2016 (an increase of £18.7m on 2014/15) and fingers in all the right tech pies Lush is definitely one to watch, and at Tech Trends we’ll continue to do just that.

What an incredible two days at the #LushSummit. pic.twitter.com/Wz46OTiBBo

— LUSH UK (@LushLtd) February 15, 2018

Sole Chirco is an emotional intelligence consultant and Tech Trends’ Wellness Tech Correspondent. Follow her on Instagram and Twitter or connect with her on LinkedIn. 

The post It’s None of My Business – Or Is It? appeared first on Tech Trends.

We meet some of the entrepreneurs combining beautiful design with technology to make the world a better place.

Art and science have never been separate. Now a new breed of polymath is embracing a combination of the creative and analytical to form meaningful connections between people and their environment. We meet the digital age Renaissance artists making a tangible impact through beautiful objects and experiences.

Smog Free Tower

For Daan Roosegaarde true beauty is clean air. His company, Studio Roosegaarde, previously worked on a variety of life-improving projects – such as light emitting bicycle paths and smart highways – before Beijing’s smog inspired him to create a ‘clean air temple’ in the city.

The Smog Free Tower, which opened in Beijing in September 2016, cleans 30,000 cubic metres of air every hour using just 1,170 watts of energy – roughly the same as it takes to power an average water boiler.

The extracted smog particles are compressed into solid materials that get turned into design objects, such as cufflinks and rings. With each sale of Smog Free Jewellery, another 1,000 cubic metres of clean air gets donated to the city. “I think it’s part of a movement of new design which is not about chairs, lamps and tables but more about how to improve life,” explained Roosegaarde.

Art and science have never been separate. Now a new breed of polymath is embracing a combination of the creative and analytical to form meaningful connections between people and their environment
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The project will now travel through several more cities in China, promoting the “dream of clean air” and looking for new collaborations with local universities and industry to develop further innovations such as bicycles that suck up polluted air and clean it as they go.

“It’s about making people part of the solution,” explains Roosegaarde. “To create real urban change you need a bottom-up approach where engaged citizens come up with their own solutions.”

DuoSkin

These striking gold leaf tattoos are actually customised wearables which communicate wirelessly with mobile devices and collect data directly from your skin. DuoSkin ‘talks’ using NFC tags, each made from a chip connected to a coil. Researchers at MIT Media Lab and Microsoft Research found a way to fabricate this using gold leaf, which can be customised to various shapes and sizes and has the advantage of being cheap, skin-friendly and robust.

“We’re aiming to celebrate the personalisation of individual style that is often missing in today’s wearable technology,” said Cindy Hsin-Liu Kao, the researcher leading the project. “Through the user-friendly fabrication process, we enable people to design and create their own skin technology”

Once applied, DuoSkin can be used to control a variety of mobile devices in close proximity to the body. “We created on-skin input elements that resemble traditional user interfaces, such as buttons, sliders, and 2D trackpads,” added Hsin-Liu Kao. These jewel-like transfers give us a glimpse into the future of human-machine symbiosis, where devices will blend seamlessly with our bodies, creating an increasingly intimate relationship between user and technology.

These gold leaf tattoos are customised wearables that communicate wirelessly with mobile devices and collect data from your skin.
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SensioAIR

Three people die every day in the UK due to asthma, but many allergy outbreaks could be avoided if people had the right information and advice.

After years of struggling with their own allergies and asthma, Lebanese entrepreneurs Cyrille Najjar and Eve Tamraz developed SensioAIR, an air quality sensor that identifies harmful particles in the air. The device connects to an app – currently in beta testing on iOS and Android – that helps people understand symptoms and manage them in real time.

Three people die every day in the UK due to asthma, but many allergy outbreaks could be avoided if people had the right information and advice
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The technology brings together Eve’s neuroscience and synthetic biology background with Cyrille’s experience as a designer and professor of prototyping at University College London. The husband-and-wife team co-founded their company – White Lab – in 2015 and raised more than $3.5 million in investment to develop the technology. The NHS alone spends around £1 billion a year treating around 5.4 million asthma patients.

Lechal

Nearly 70 million people in India are visually impaired. When living in Bangalore in 2010, Anirudh Sharma experienced this first hand: “I used to see a lot of visually-challenged people, and my motivation was to bring something to them that would be truly useful,” he explained.

His Lechal system fits a haptic insole to the inside of a shoe, which is connected to an Android app integrated with Google Maps. Users are guided to their destination by a series of vibrations, which build in intensity as the wearer nears points where they have to turn. A proximity sensor in the front of the shoe also alerts them of obstacles, leaving their hands and hearing free to avoid dangers such as traffic.

The Lechal system fits a haptic insole to the inside of a shoe, which is connected to an Android app integrated with Google Maps. Users are guided to their destination by a series of vibrations
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The initial goal was to help the visually impaired, but Lechal is now being marketed to “directionally challenged” users as well. The device – which will cost $180 when it goes on sale in November – allows people to use navigation tools such as Google Maps without constantly checking their smartphone. As well as being convenient, this brings the added advantage of making users less vulnerable to collision and theft, both of which are more likely when carrying your phone in your hand. Part of the sale proceeds will also go towards subsidising kits for blind users who are unable to purchase the full-price devices.

Ocean Cleanup Project

If you try to fight the ocean, you will lose
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In 2013 Boyan Slat dropped out of his aerospace engineering course to pursue another ambition: clearing the world’s oceans of harmful plastic debris. The Dutch inventor and entrepreneur was only 18 at the time, but now – at the grand old age of 21 – he’s well on his way to making it happen. Having crowdfunded more than $2 million for the Ocean Cleanup Project, Slat currently heads a team of around 50 engineers and researchers from the operation’s headquarters in Delftin the Netherlands.

“If you try to fight the ocean, you will lose,” he said. So instead of going after plastic debris with vessels and nets, the idea is to leverage nature itself to drive the clean-up process. The Ocean Cleanup Project designed a network of extremely long floating barriers that remain stationary in the water, using the ocean’s natural currents to concentrate the plastic towards collection points.

The debris is then recycled and sold, with proceeds going towards making the operation self-sustaining. The first working prototype is currently being tested in the North Sea, and full deployment is scheduled for 2020.

Instead of going after plastic debris with vessels and nets, the idea is to leverage nature itself to drive the clean-up process
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Article originally published on Wired

From smog-eating towers to ocean-cleaning barriers, how design is inspiring innovation #WIRED2016https://t.co/NY4NVRYXyd pic.twitter.com/UFneb7KcSf

— Wired UK (@WiredUK) November 1, 2016

Alice Bonasio is a VR Consultant and Tech Trends’ Editor in Chief. She also regularly writes for Fast Company, Ars Technica, Quartz, Wired and others. Connect with her on LinkedIn and follow @alicebonasio and @techtrends_tech on Twitter.

The post Meet the Digital Age Renaissance Artists appeared first on Tech Trends.