Sustainability Seminar: Quality & Choice by Shane Snipes

December 11, 2012 at 12:45pm in BA 535

As a conclusion to the fall semester, we have invited Shane Snipes to address sustainability in the context of profit and non-profit businesses.

He has entitled his session, "Quality and choice: How value drives nonprofit and for-profit goals in sustainability." There has been a growing interest in recent years in the potential use of for-profit products or nonprofit social innovation services. The differentiation in sustainability offerings mainly through labeling and certification can be a means of promoting and rewarding the sustainable management and exploitation of natural resources. Greater social impacts can also be created through community social entrepreneurship.

A study of the response of consumers to the introduction of labelled products explores product differentiation to promote sustainable offerings. In the workshop, results will be discussed in the context of ‘quality versus quantity’ of consumer choice. The scale of the effect of labeling has been shown to be greater for quality forms of differentiation than the effect generated by other potential labels.

In nonprofit or social innovation opportunities, quality choice can be used to drive impacts. ‘Sustainable quality’ is a useful framework to determine not only fiscal stability, but also community effectiveness on a broader scale. The workshop will interactively present sustainable quality versus unsustainability quantity. These concepts will then be explored in terms of their practical sustainability applications.

Shane has worked in the field of sustainability for a long time and has extensive international experience in development and sustainability education. He has launched numerous businesses, including his current project Eco-Road Trip where his goal is to conduct 1000 conversations about sustainability around the world.

We request that you RSVP to scnetimpact@gmail.com.

Hope to see you there!