The Responsible Consumer

7 Principles for Fewer Better Things

Big Sur, California. Morning view to the south from my overnight camp-out along the winding Pacific Coastal Highway. Photo: Per Håkansson.

Editor’s Note

Hello,

Now publishing on Saturdays at midnight (PST) so that all subscribers, from Hawaii to New Zealand, can enjoy Fewer Better Things during the weekend. Also introducing a new section – On The Road – where I share my experiments plus recommendations, below the main story. Enjoy!

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The Future of The Responsible Consumer

After I wrote “The Responsible Company” for Unsustainable, literally outside the Stanford Doerr School of Sustainability, I strolled around the campus to let the deadline fever subside and switch to mindful reflection.

Walking in nature oxygenize and clears my mind and frees up space for new thoughts and ideas. And the first that entered was: if there are responsible companies, there must be responsible consumers.

I kept walking along the rows of pinewood and old oak trees up to the cafeteria. If we applied the mindset of the responsible company, described by Patagonia, what would a responsible consumer lifestyle look like?, I pondered.

In the book The Future of The Responsible Company (highly recommended), Yvon Chouinard and Vincent Stanley, Director of Philosophy write:

“Living in a world of fewer, better things that reflect their true social and environmental cost may prompt us to shop less as a form of entertainment. That wouldn’t be so bad. We might recover time to pursue other deep interests and pleasures, and have more time with our friends and family.”

My heart skipped a beat and my mind was momentarily blown. If there was ever a time to say “Boom!” and to shadow fist bump, it was now. My mind now knew what my intuition always had known: this is the right path forward.

Fewer, better things. My words, their writing.

In Patagonia’s parlor, responsibility is taking full ownership of all actions and their impact and unintended consequences, from raw materials to recycling. What would that look like from the consumer perspective?

Might there be a few principles we could extract from past writings and learnings that could become the guidelines for responsible consumption? Indeed there are, and here is my first attempt to craft that manifest.

7 Principles for Fewer Better Things

1. Only buy quality things to fulfill a frequent human need. This is the most responsible you can do on all levels. Great quality adds new dimensions to your needs and deepens the relationship between you and your things.

2. Use what you have first; reuse, repair, repurpose, and remake. It’s easy to get seduced by marketing and there are a lot of products to fall in love with. But asking yourself the question “Do I really need this?” helps. Make an inventory if what you already have and could reuse before buying new.

3. Choose pre-loved, second hand, or used before newly made. There are now more “pre-loved” stores, both offline and online, than ever before. The resale industry is today a multi-billion dollar business world wide.