Author Archives: Federico Villarreal Zuñiga

Stella McCartney Upcycling

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Hey Guys,

i was just reading an article on “The Independent” which talked about the famous designer Stella McCartney and her recent collection that hit the catwalk in Paris Fashion Week. The clothing the models wore to showcase her fashion designs were made from second-hand materials. Her catwalk design gave a second life to t-shirts and other worn garments that quote – “were going to get thrown away or burned or landfilled”

So I would love to talk about the fact that a fashion designer, who has been worn by several celebrities with her clothing being priced at the hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars for her pieces, has recycled old garments. These will likely be worn by people worth hundreds of millions of dollars.

She has been one of the first ones, if not the first, to show featured upcycled clothing at Paris Fashion Week. This will likely be the start of a new era, were designers will show a focus on “giving a second life to clothing” instead of just throwing them away.

In class, we have talked about the fact that a new business model needs to take place. The linear system is not working, also known as the cradle-to-grave model. Instead, she is proposing using raw materials from recycled garments. This is a clear example of process innovation, where the designer is changing the usual process to a new one. This will save many natural resources as well, including water, and other raw materials.

We are seeing over and over again that sustainability is trending, and this is a great example that a closed-loop will be the new black among major fashion brands.

 

References:

Ritschel, Chelsea. (2019, March 5). Stella McCartney Show Featured “Upclycled” Clothes During Paris Fashion Week. Retrieved April 2, 2019 from <https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/fashion/stella-mccartney-upcycle-paris-fashion-week-sustainability-a8809271.html>

Carnaval! 2019

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Hey guys,

So just this semester, I got accepted to be part of the External Team of the Brazilian Student Association. During the semester, most of the focus went to the typical Brazilian party that millions of tourists want to attend: CARNAVAL. 

While we were planning Carnaval, we talked about many things such as how to reach to our target market, which are students that like and enjoy Brazilian/latin vibes. We also talked about how the target market would be able to purchase tickets to the events, the entertainment we were going to provide; we basically made this service start to end.

When planning it, there were different opinions about how we should do the event. One of the  main discussions we had was whether having tickets for the event or having them online. Some of the BRASA team wanted the tickets to be printed out (around 500 of them), for they have several benefits such as having people go to the booth, building the hype when people buy them, having cash as soon as possible, and an “easy” way to track the inventory of the tickets.

However, my opinion completely differed from that of some members of the team. I wanted to provide the tickets to our target market electronically for different reasons. The first one was convenience. As we talked about during class, the typical four P´s are moving towards the 4´cs. Convenience is one of the main reasons people would buy something or not. If people need to go somewhere, where they have to walk several minutes and possibly do a line to buy tickets, they wont. However, electronically, the students could buy their tickets by just doing several clicks. Having them electronically also gave the students the ability of having their tickets on their phone, saving them the trouble of not loosing their ticket. They have the convenience of having everything in one place.

My other point also focused on another C, which is the costs. Printing the tickets, with different colors and serial numbers have costs. As we were having a charitable event, we wanted to reduce costs as much as possible. Having the tickets online saved us many types of costs, directly or indirectly.

From my experience planning this event, I could see how the 4´Cs strategy really affects daily decisions. Consumers are changing and providing them services should change with them as well.

 

“Lopez Obrador is Dismantling Democracy in Mexico” – Bloomberg

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Hey Guys,

Today I was reading an article about how the recently appointed Mexican president is basically dismantling the Mexican democracy… and that is something dangerous. Throughout Mexican history we can see that people and political groups that are in power want to stay in power. This can be seen with the first Mexican dictator, Porfirio Diaz, or the 70+ years straight that the presidents elected are from the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI). Presidents in Mexico can almost literally do anything they want. There are several checks and balances that the legislative and judiciary system has in place, however, no Mexican president has left their position of power unless they are killed (Im like 80% sure about his statement). Still, its pretty common that the party the President belongs to also controls the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate.

Bloomberg´s article talked about how the President of Mexico pretty much has a lot of power, and how the new President is changing the whole democracy so he can have, basically, unlimited power. He has cut salaries from judges, appointed a long-lasting friend of his to the highest court in Mexico, he makes policy from referendums where only biased groups answer; he even stopped the construction of the new airport in Mexico City so the military can construct their own and obtain revenue from the constriction and operations. He has also cut salaries, budgets to Mexican cities, among other unimaginable activities. However, the only good news I got out of the article is that any President can do whatever they want, as long as they have funds. It doesn’t matter how popular the President is with the public, if he/she doesn’t have any money, he/she cant to anything.

So basically, Im just waiting for this populist old guy to deplete the funds, and all the projects he is currently funding to not work out so Mexico can go back to normal. Money = Power, but Power =/= Money, and that is never going to change.

O´Niel, Shannon. (2019, March 11). Lopez Obrador is Dismantling Democracy in Mexico. Retrieved March 12, 2019, from https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2019-03-11/lopez-obrador-is-dismantling-democracy-in-mexico?fbclid=IwAR39h5PPyb-5u3YfjkZD8sZdpo7kZ8bP1VuoRqSRLEpxizpPDSa-w_G19S4

Acciona – Major Sustainable Company

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Hey guys, in this blog post Im not going to talk about irrelevant social media families such as the Kardashians. Im going to talk about a company that helped restore my faith in business. Some time ago, my father talked to me about a Spanish company, with their revenues in the billions of euros, that wanted to buy his company. Anyways, after he told me the name of the company, I started looking into it and it seemed amazing. Just recently, in my Innovation and Sustainability class, we were asked to research a company and basically critique their business practices through a sustainability lens. This company is so great that I want to tell you about it.

Acciona is a Spanish company that has several business divisions: Infrastructure, Energy, Water, and Other Businesses. They build roads and bridges, to harvesting and providing clean energy from those wind things and solar panels, desalinate and basically clean water and provide it to millions of people, and even has a fund management and investing business. They basically are so diverse that they can do anything and everything. However I thought that a construction company needs to “bad” and pollute or have an environmental footprint, and I was right… until a certain point.

Several of Acciona´s business practices do pollute and release GHG emissions, however, through their other businesses they mitigate that impact. In 2016, the company became carbon neutral. Acciona also works on mitigating their social impact and their environmental impact. This is the first time I have seen this but the company has a Social Impact Methodology, where they asses the negative and positive consequences of their business practices. Through their sustainable business model, they strive for sustainability.

The company discloses their sustainability reports for years now. They form part and signed onto the Paris Agreement. Acciona also helps achieve several of the United Nations Sustainability Development Goals. Basically, the company does everything that EVERY SINGLE COMPANY needs to do. Even their instagram is on point. Thank you and hope your faith is restored in business like mine is.

(Photo from Acciona.com)

References:

Acciona Media. (2019). Social Impact Management. Retrieved March 10, 2019 from <https://www.acciona.com/sustainability/society/social-impact/>

The World’s Youngest Billionaire

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There are certain families that are taking over the world’s news. Some of them include President Trumps family, the Obamas, the Gates, the Beckhams, the Jonas Brothers, among others. However, there is only one family that basically rules Instagram and social media in general, and that is the Kardashians. With all the sisters carrying more than 74 million followers each, some even crossing 130 million followers, people all over the world know who they are.

Picture from Forbes.com

However, just yesterday, one of the sisters made the headline of Forbes in what can be basically be the most important and relevant of all time, being named the world’s youngest self-made billionaire. Kylie Jenner, daughter of mothers Kris Jenner and Caitlyn Jenner, started her fame as part of the reality TV show: Keeping Up With The Kardashians. As her fame grew as well as her Instagram following, Kylie Jenner took advantage of the situation and started her own company, Kylie Cosmetics by Kylie Jenner.

Kylie Jenner basically used the 4´c in perfection. In the communication side, she used her hundred and thirty million follower platform on Instagram. She was creative in a way that she was “there” with her consumers along the way, where she used the products herself and showed their customers how to use them. In the convenience sector, she used the Instagram platform to sell almost everything online. With a swipe up from her Instagram stories, customers were directed to her website to buy their products. Her costs are somewhat affordable, on par with the market she placed herself in. And finally, she gave the consumers the wants and needs they think they want. People want to look like her, have the same things like her, even have the same makeup. She branded and marketed her makeup line perfectly.

Image from Forbes.com

The newly published article named 71 billionaires under 40, where more than half of them were self made. This article has sparked major conversation among social media. People have, lets say, mixed opinions about Kylie being named a “self-made” billionaire. Many of the conversation focuses on the fact that Kylie had so much help from her family. Others say that her billion dollars are part of the hype her family currently has. Meanwhile, the rest of them, me included, think that Kylie had indeed a platform and millions of dollars to her name. She, however, used everything she had at her disposition to elevate herself and everything she wanted to do.

Anyways, thats the scoop for today 🙂

References:

Chaykowski, Kathleen. (2019, March 5). The World’s Youngest Billionaires in 2019: Meet The 71 Under Age 40. Retrieved from <https://www.forbes.com/sites/kathleenchaykowski/2019/03/05/the-worlds-youngest-billionaires-in-2019-meet-the-71-under-age-40/#6087301a411e>

Brexit – Failure or major failure

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As many of you in this class know, Britain’s former prime minister chose to leave to its citizens, through ballot, the option whether or not Britain should stay in the European Union or leave. This major reform, otherwise known as Brexit, was successful due to the fact that majority of the citizens wanted out of the European Union. Many of them voting “yes”, fearing the fact that millions of immigrants where entering Europe and would cause a severe disruption to their daily life. Britain citizens were also “mad” because fake news told them hundreds of millions, if not billions, of dollars were lost because Europe Mainland were taking them.

After Brexit was passed, the former Prime Minister resigned from the position causing a major disruption to the region’s politics. After, the new right-wing Prime Minister was elected named Theresa May. She led with the idea that she would unite Britain again and lead Britain through Brexit. She failed.

Talks with the European Union are shortly coming to an end, where they require Britain to have an exit package. Theresa May, without the ability to unite politicians, has failed miserably to pass Brexit even in the country that voted in favor of it. With a few months left in the timeline, she needs to give something to the European Union or everything will burst into flames.

The biggest unintended consequence of Brexit is the following: London, a city that once used to be the Finance capital in Europe, is loosing billions of dollars due to the fact that banks and investment firms are fleeing uncertainty. They’re leaving London and choosing a new finance hub in Mainland Europe, where some candidates are Madrid, Berlin, Paris, Amsterdam, Frankfurt, Brussels, and Dublin.

We need to see if the Politicians from the European Union and Britain come into an agreement on the exit package. And if they don’t, will Great Britain suffer from this wildly controversial referendum? More to see later on…

References and for further information:

– Daniel, Ellen. (2018, September 2011). Which cities could be the new financial centre of Europe after Brexit. Retrieved March4, 2019 <https://www.verdict.co.uk/financial-centre-of-europe-post-brexit/>

– Mueller, Benjamin. (2019, February 25). What is Brexit? A Simple Guide to Why It Matters and What Happens Next. Retrieved March 4, 2019 <https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/world/europe/what-is-brexit.html>

– Picture = https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-32810887

Meat vs. Cultured Lab Meat

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In many of my high-school classes, sustainability classes at UBC including Sustainability Marketing, I´ve seen how the meat industry has always been considered as “the bad guy”. The meat industry has been involved in major deforestation worldwide to grow the cattle, chickens, pigs, etc. The meat industry also needs nearly a quarter of the world´s freshwater. 14.5% of the GHG emitted worldwide comes from raising the livestock, which includes methane gas, a gas even more damaging than carbon dioxide.

There are many statistics about how the meat industry is affecting the world and accelerating climate change. Many discussions regarding the allocation of the water, food used to feed the livestock, and the land, to be allocated to people in poverty. Despite all the statistics, all the research involved in how meat affects a human, and all the discussion, the meat consumption is expected to increase nearly 95% by 2050 due to the rise in population and higher incomes among the middle class. However, alternatives to meat has been a trend in the recent years: where fast food companies released their “beyond” burgers, and lab-grown meat was discovered and now being produced.

Big brands such as Tyson is investing in harvesting animal cells instead of raising the actual animal. Cultured meat poses as an alternative to people that want to eat meat, but want to their food to have a lower carbon footprint. However, a recent article by BBC showed how cultured (lab grown) meat may have more implications to climate change than the alternative due to its CO2 emissions. Livestock and the meat industry contribute heavily to climate change, where gases more powerful than carbon dioxide, such as methane, are emitted. The article pointed out that these type of gases only stay in the atmosphere for a dozen years, and then they are gone. Carbon dioxide, on the other hand, can stay for Millenia. So climate change wise, the solution may impact the earth and worsen climate change in the long run.

People that care about the environment are already phasing out meat. Others are trying to eat it a few times a week, and increase their consumption of vegetables. I dont really think that Cultured meat is a good idea to mass produce. The energy it takes to create it and the water use is far to great to be a good alternative to meat and help decrease climate change.

 

Reference

McGrath, Matt. (19 February 2019). Cultured lab meat may make climate change worse. Retrieved from <https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-47283162>

“Greenland´s Melting Ice Nears a Tipping Point” – NYT

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For many years now, we have seen how climate change has affected most, if not all, lives. The impact on each person doesn’t necessarily mean that its direct; it could be either through a prolonged change in weather, less crops throughout the supermarket, etc. However, climate change has had a severe impact in recent years: wildfires in British Columbia and California, ongoing droughts in California, floods and hurricanes throughout Mexico, and the depletion of ice caps in the Arctic and Antarctic. These rough changes can be traced back to a single species: humans.

According to various sources, The New York Times being part of the group, Greenland´s ice sheet is reaching a “tipping point”, where past the specified point, the ice sheet cannot go back to its previous state no matter what action. The Arctic, which is warming faster than anywhere else on the planet, is loosing more than 250 billion tons of ice per year. Due to the loss of the ice sheets, sea levels will rice and about 20-80 million people worldwide will be affected by it; and guess what… businesses will be affected too!

During class, we have talked about how companies have approached sustainability in various ways such as Toms with their social model, or Starbucks with their initiative to get rid of the plastic lining. These changes are meaningful and may be something innovative in the market, however, it is not necessary. Radical changes by both consumers and companies need to be made. These changes need to be on a completely new scale; a scale where a reduction in Greenhouse Gasses is meaningful enough so Greenland doesn’t pass the tipping point. “By limiting greenhouse gas emissions we limit warming, and thus also limit how rapidly and intensely Greenland affects our livelihoods through sea-level rise.” “That, it seems, is our call to make.” – Dr. Trusel.

We may think that “Yeah, its okay, we still have time to change things”, or maybe, “Well, companies are trying”… we have reached the point where trying is not enough and there is no more time. We need to try to reduce our carbon footprint to the lowest we can. There is a need to think about the environment with EVERY single activity or decision we do.

Source:

Schwartz, John. (2019, January 21). Greenland´s Melting Ice Nears a “Tipping Point”, Scientists Say. Retrieved from <https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/21/climate/greenland-ice.html?action=click&module=News&pgtype=Homepage>