We’re a volunteer-led team, and a soon-to-incorporate social enterprise. Next up - becoming a financially sustainable business. As our goal is to help the individuals within FMCG brands, we have no plans to monetise access to our content. Instead, we plan to take other routes, like working with our network of partners (companies that work with FMCG brands) to build sponsor relationships. It’s a new but essential pillar of the business.

→ Our Commercial & Partnerships Vision:

<aside> 🌱 How can we financially enable everything we do at Following the Footprints via commercial partnerships? Aligning with industry players we respect, and who share our vision, will be more important than ever. How can we work with external organisations on current content, future resources, events and more? How can we not jeopardise the trust of our readers, or the authenticity of our content, but reach new audiences and trial new collaborations?

</aside>

→ What we’re currently focused on:

• Monetising our Meet the Partners series. We’re starting to monetise our Meet the Partners series, profiling the companies brands can work with on their sustainability journey. All partners we feature can be found in our databases, overseen by Research. You can see an example here.
• Setting up our commercial muscle. Defining our costs, scoping partnership packages, developing conversations with potential key partners and figuring out what our commercial strategy even is.

→ Just some of what you could be doing:

• Creating sponsorship opportunities for our databases. MEASURE has been the leading carbon accounting x consumer goods tracker for almost two years. MITIGATE, MANAGE and COMMUNICATE will be no different. There are partners who both want to sponsor and tap in via API to these resources - what does that agreement look like? Who do we want to align with?
• Developing our Meet the Partners pipeline. An anticipated first step, this will be an important (and more immediate) route to becoming financially sustainable. You’ll be crossing over with Research to identify key players for this.
• Working with Community on events. We’re building ways for individuals within brands to connect with each other. How can partners support these efforts?
• Platform collaborations. Are there ways for partners to tap into and harness the high quality weekly content we produce - either for their platforms, or on our own?
• Managing inbound requests. We get a lot of interest in sponsored posts - setting up a process to track, communicate and execute on these will be key. This can overlap with Content & Editorial too.

Note: What you focus on will be informed by your ideas and expertise. The above list is simply to give you an sense for what this sub-team will focus on.