“It’s all about transparency. We are not 100% sustainable with every piece … because it is difficult for a startup to do that from that start. But we are all the time working towards that [and we] celebrate the victories we have along the way.” 

Filip Carlberg, CMO & Co-Founder, BRU 

“They can get an independent carbon footprint evaluation to look at their complete supply chain and also they can use blockchain to verify each step of any process and prove provenance.” 

Kevin R Smith, Business Mentor & Advisor  

“There's a lot of self-congratulation around in the 'good business' scene. I'd say it’s really easy to avoid – just don't write anything down/talk about that you're not actually doing. Greenwashing hardly ever happens 'accidentally', so I wonder if this is the right question to ask? Maybe it would be better to define what greenwashing actually means? e.g., a hosting company says they are carbon neutral but the only thing they do is paying to offset carbon. That's a conscious decision. That's not the company trying to be greener, they are just trying to look greener. Is that greenwashing?” 

Rita Mantler, Director & Founder at Telescopic and Co-Founder & CTO at Medixus 

“We are seeing ‘sustainability’ being thrown on every pitch deck we are seeing whether its relevant or not. Feels like some startups and entrepreneurs are capitalising on sustainability as a USP even though the majority of them do not know what it actually means to be sustainable … The existing and upcoming businesses are in desperate need for practical sustainability support where they are educated on how to start integrating sustainability and Circular Economy principles into their core supply chain, operations, and business model.” 

Omran Al-Habbal, COO of BEC & Director of FORWARD Accelerator