Brand owners should jump on the bandwagon of tackling the climate change crisis because only by getting involved and making a concerted effort can we hope to solve the problem together, AIB’s managing director of homes Tom Kinsella told a World War Z breakfast event organised by youth marketing agency Thinkhouse’s Youth Lab.
People can often criticise you for getting involved – seeing it as a ‘trend’, but only good can come from getting engaged, Kinsella added. The Thinkhouse Planet team shared facts, stories and advice on what organisations, businesses and brands can do as part of World War Z – as we battle alongside young people to fix the climate crisis.
The event was positioned as ‘a new dawn’ for Ireland’s marketing and advertising industry. Speaking at the event, Jane McDaid, founder, Thinkhouse, said: “Our job is to protect our clients – regardless of how difficult or great the challenge may be. A slow response, or no response at all – puts brands and companies at risk of becoming extinct”.
Guests heard from Jeremy Mathieu, world-renowned leading sustainability advisor, who shared some stark reality from the globe in the face of climate crisis. Laura Costello, senior strategist and planner at Thinkhouse, set the scene by sharing five facts that illustrated some of the reasons as to why this is, in fact, World War Z, a climate emergency.
“There’s only about a five per cent chance that we’ll avoid warming by at least 2 degrees come the end of the century. We now find ourselves faced with the challenge of safeguarding our collective future, against the odds, literally in the last seconds of the last minute of extra time,” Costello said. There are five climate facts that need to be noted:
- We are using the resources of 1.7 planets;
- The Earth’s 2019 Overshoot Day was July 29
(The day at which a whole year’s worth of resources have been used and after which we are essentially borrowing from future resources – essentially ‘overspending’.); - We are at one degree of warming already;
- We have a five per cent chance of avoiding at least two degrees of warming;
- Household consumption contributes to over 60 per cent of global GHG emissions.
The event saw a panel discussion with Tara Peterman, executive producer of RTÉ on Climate; Tom Kinsella, managing director, Homes, AIB Group and John Curran, Musgrave’s head of sustainability. The panel shared examples of how some of Ireland’s top companies are mobilising their teams and responding to the climate emergency.
Claire Hyland, head of The Youth Lab at Thinkhouse, shared findings from its new Youth Culture Uncovered 2019 report, a nationally representative survey of 1,200 16+ year olds. Hyland said they called the event World War Z because this is now the biggest youthquake of our time. When asked what they would ask brands or businesses to prioritise to help tackle the climate crisis, Gen Z’s number one ask (out of 12 options) is for businesses to stop chasing economic growth at the expense of our planet and measuring success by profit margin.
Thinkhouse is the first Irish agency to sign the open letter pledge to tackle climate crisis.
The full Youth Culture Uncovered 2019 report is available at theyouthlab.com
Pictured are Jane McDaid, Thinkhouse and Al Hester, aka Maser
