DuPont Packaging Awards Show Sustainability Drives Innovation

DuPont made the announcement of the winners for their 23rd packaging awards yesterday. DuPont packaging awards dates back to 1986. “The awards is the industry’s longest running, global, independently judged celebration of innovation and collaboration throughout the value chain.”

And welcome to social media! Because I learned about it via @DuPont_ability (their witter account for their sustainability news) and the winners was announced through a global webcast.

TV is so the ’90s

These are signals that show us that the next generation – Class of 2011 – don’t watch as much TV as the general population (that’s us). They use mobile for video viewing, blogs/ social networks for interaction and info.

Kids Today…

• Are the Heaviest Mobile Video Viewers: On average, mobile subscribers ages 12-17 watched 7 hours 13 minutes of mobile video a month in Q4 2010, compared to 4 hours 20 minutes for the general population.
• Are More Receptive to Mobile Advertising than their Elders: More than half (58%) surveyed in September 2010 said they “always” or “sometimes” look at mobile ads.
• Out-Text All Other Age Groups: In Q1 2011, teens 13-17 sent an average of 3,364 mobile texts per month, more than doubling the rate of the next most active texting demo, 18-24 year olds (1,640 texts per month).
• Talk Less on the Phone: Besides seniors 65-plus, teens talk the least on their phones, talking an average of 515 minutes per month in Q1 2011 versus more than 750 minutes among 18-24 year olds.
• Grew Up in the Age of Social Media—and It Shows: While they make up just 7.4 percent of those using social networks, 78.7 percent of 12-17 year olds visited social networks or blogs.
• Watch Less TV than the General Population: The average American watched 34 hours 39 minutes of TV per week in Q4 2010, a year-over-year increase of two minutes. Teens age 12-17 watch the least amount of TV on average (23 hours 41 minutes per week).
• Spend Less Time on their Computers: American 18 year olds averaged 39 hours, 50 minutes online from their home computers, of which 5 hours, 26 minutes was spent streaming online video.

via Nielsen Wire

Green is the World’s Trend

I found that green is a growing trend. Saw in a number of places how green products and services (including slogans) are popping up here and there. Organic. Natural products. Recycled, biodegradeble packaging. Fair trade. And more.

Attitude and behavior not there yet. But at least products are becoming commonly available on some supermarkets’ shelves, though still selling at premium. Anyone, any business, who can come up with affordable organic products could (potentially) capture market share. Asia has almost two-thirds of world’s population.

There’s an old saying ‘a picture is worth a thousand words.’ So, below you’ll see pictures I took at random places in Jakarta, Indonesia and Bangkok, Thailand. 

5 Global Forces that Will Shape The Future of Your Business

Reasons for rethinking business as we go forward to 2011 and beyond. According to McKinsey Quarterly, there are five global forces that will shape the future of business and society that represents both opportunities and challenges. 

“These trends are important because each of them can create, reshape, or extinguish entire industries,” says Patrick Vigueri of McKinsey’s. (emphasis added)

1. The rise of emerging market as the center of consumerism and innovation.

2. The imperative to improve developed-market productivity.

3. Ever-expanding (and interconnected) global networks.

4. The tension between rapidly rising resource consumption and sustainability.

5. The increasingly larger role of the state as a business partner and regulator.

Watch the video. 

http://www.mckinseyquarterly.com/App_Themes/v2.0/swf/external_player.swf

For transcript, here.