How Immutable & Encrypted Data Empowers Our Customers to Clearly Communicate Their Brand’s Plastic Action Story

By Vanessa Coleman, CEO

At Oceanworks, we’re fortunate to work with  brand partners who are committed to taking action against plastic pollution. We arm them with the data, traceability and visuals they need to achieve their plastic reduction goals and shape compelling sustainability programs for their organizations.

I’m proud to announce that Oceanworks is launching the Plastic Action Dashboard, a tool at the intersection of traceability and global commerce that seamlessly provides our partners robust tracking capabilities and metrics about their sustainable plastic programs. The Plastic Action Dashboard is built upon Oceanworks Track & Trace immutable & encrypted ledger data captured at each point in the supply chain, documenting the movement of plastic waste as it’s diverted from the environment and returned to the circular economy through Oceanworks’ sustainable plastic solutions.

For brand partners leveraging Oceanworks solutions to fulfill their plastic action goals, having access to this level of detail is more critical than ever before. Today’s consumers are keenly aware of the global plastic pollution problem and are actively seeking out brands and products that reduce plastic’s impact on the environment. A joint study from McKinsey and NielsenIQ shows U.S. consumers “overwhelmingly” prefer “environmentally and ethically sustainable products”, with the majority of consumers reporting that “a sustainable lifestyle is important to them”. And, that same research shows that brands enjoy higher product growth when they go beyond vague messaging and instead make clear and  specific claims about their commitments to sustainability and environmental, social, and governance (ESG) issues.

CREATING ULTIMATE TRANSPARENCY

Of course, sustainability claims must be verifiable – and helping our customers achieve ultimate transparency is foundational to everything we do. To ensure accurate reporting and real-world results for our customers, we gather and track every bit of available data about batches of plastic waste as they’re diverted from the environment and move through collection, aggregation, processing, and manufacturing facilities. 

By capturing that information on this ledger technology, Oceanworks provides an immutable record of the plastic kept out of oceans and landfills through our Material and IMPAC+ offerings. We illustrate this impact plainly, showing our customers just how much plastic has been diverted down to the nearest kilogram, making it simple for our customers to stay on track with their plastic reduction goals.

ADDING VALUE ACROSS CUSTOMERS’ ORGANIZATIONS

In addition to authenticating material movement, the Plastic Action Dashboard boosts our brand partners’ communications efforts by providing key energy savings and environmental benefits of their plastic programs, and by using easy-to-understand terms and equivalencies that visualize these benefits for consumers. The user experience has been thoughtfully designed so partners can filter their Dashboard data and clearly define specific layers of impacts. This empowers our partners and their marketing teams to accurately and confidently convey that information to their own stakeholders and customers via product descriptions, packaging, and brand campaigns.

The Plastic Action Dashboard makes it a snap for our customers to keep their marketing materials up to date with the latest data. Via the Dashboard, our Oceanworks team provides tailored language recommendations for accurately describing the results of their initiatives. Partners also have access to a bespoke communications toolkit and collection of Oceanworks brand assets that are ready to plug into campaign materials.

These tools  support our customers in the way they speak internally about plastic action, help to bolster company culture and aid in recruitment and retention of employees who overwhelmingly care about sustainability. Gen Z, expected to make up nearly a third of the U.S. workforce by 2025, say they are “more likely to apply to a job that is committed to sustainable practices,” and that three in five would avoid an employer that seems to have a negative environmental impact. With these imperatives in mind, the Plastic Action Dashboard enables our customers to maintain real-time plastic impact metrics and continuously promote the goals and benchmarks reached through Oceanworks plastic offset programs.

TRACING MATERIAL AND IMPACT WITH CERTAINTY

It will also be a breeze for our customers’ sourcing and supply chain departments to gather key documentation such as Certificates of Analysis, Technical Data Sheets, Bills of Lading, and Safety Data Sheets, and maintain chain-of-custody assurance every step of the way. Our customers’ finance teams can also plug into the Plastic Action Dashboard to access their complete history of purchase orders and invoices. With Oceanworks Track & Trace built into the Dashboard, Oceanworks Guaranteed partners can monitor the latest movements and details of their orders via a visual interface.  

At Oceanworks, our bottom-line goal is to empower brands to take plastic action to combat plastic pollution today. The new Plastic Action Dashboard is an important step toward our mission of extreme transparency and reliability as brands’ trusted plastic action partner.

This Plastic Action Dashboard platform will continue to evolve with new tools  and module additions, each step unlocking even more visibility into the work throughout our network to combat plastic pollution and return plastic waste to the circular economy. Oceanworks is thrilled to bring this platform and technology to the market and are looking forward to working with our partners to leverage this tool to accelerate and focus their plastic action initiatives. 

Interested in learning how your organization can take on plastic pollution? Visit our website to learn more about Oceanworks Material and IMPAC+ programs or to request a demo.