Business for sufficiency database

We need to change not only our production but also consumption patterns to meet current sustainability challenges. The idea of sufficiency advocates changes in consumption levels to stay within planetary boundaries (e.g., climate change, biodiversity) and ensure livelihoods for current and future generations. Businesses that work towards sustainable business models need to ensure that they support sufficiency, rather than inadvertently pushing for increased resource consumption.

To showcase existing businesses that promote sufficiency to their customers, Circular X researcher Laura Niessen developed a database of companies for public use. The database is meant to stimulate companies to consider sufficiency as part of their business models. By providing real-world examples of businesses that support sufficiency, it highlights the viability of sufficiency-oriented strategies and provides inspiration for what can be done.

The database was developed through a review of publicly-available data of 150 companies (and growing) that support sufficient consumption across a range of sectors. For each firm, you can find details on the company, a summary of their business model and the strategies used to promote sufficiency, as well as info on the key business model elements (value proposition, creation and delivery, capture).

Companies were contacted to review their entries and reviewed entries are marked with an asterix (*).

To filter the entries, you can open the original spreadsheet here:

The database will continue growing, so if you know of a company that you think should be added or have any feedback on the database, feel free to reach out to l.niessen[a]maastrichtuniversity.nl.

The Business for Sufficiency tool was presented at the NBM conference 2022 in Rome. When using or referring to the tool, you can use this reference (Niessen, L., Bocken, N. (2022) A Sufficiency Business Database as a Tool to Drive Sustainable Business Models. 7^th International Conference on New Business Models, 22-24 June, Rome, Italy). 

Disclaimer: Companies were added to the database if their communications promoted sufficiency practices. Circular X did not assess the extent to which the listed businesses promote sufficiency in their overall business activities.