Marcus joins host Yiuwin Tsang and shares an inspiring story of how not being able to breathe during a nasty bout of COVID led him to pledge to plant one million trees, and ultimately co-found The Million Tree Pledge. He urges us all to be good ancestors and shares the steps businesses need to take to get on the path to net zero carbon emissions.
Marcus Hemsley is the Founder of the digital growth agency, Fountain Partnership, winner of Google's Global Award for Growing Businesses Online. Marcus is also a Founding Member of The Million Tree Pledge. Launched on Earth Day in April 2021, The Million Tree Pledge is a collaborative initiative that’s brought together more than 60 inspiring businesses who have made the bold commitment to plant 41 million trees in the coming years, as well as to each find another two other pledgers, ensuring the initiative grows exponentially.
Marcus joins host Yiuwin Tsang and shares an inspiring story of how not being able to breathe during a nasty bout of COVID led him to pledge to plant one million trees, and ultimately co-found The Million Tree Pledge. He urges us all to be good ancestors and shares the steps businesses need to take to get on the path to net zero carbon emissions.
Marcus Hemsley is the Founder of the digital growth agency, Fountain Partnership, winner of Google's Global Award for Growing Businesses Online. Marcus is also a Founding Member of The Million Tree Pledge. Launched on Earth Day in April 2021, The Million Tree Pledge is a collaborative initiative that’s brought together more than 60 inspiring businesses who have made the bold commitment to plant 41 million trees in the coming years, as well as to each find another two other pledgers, ensuring the initiative grows exponentially.
I'm your host Yiuwin Tsang. This episode, I'm joined by Marcus Hemsley. Marcus is the founder of the digital growth agency Fountain Partnership, winner of Google's global award for growing businesses online. Marcus is also a founding member of the Million Tree Pledge launched on Earth Day in April, 2021. The Million Tree Pledge is a collaborative initiative that's brought together more than 60 inspiring businesses who have made the bold commitment to plant 41 million trees in the coming years, as well as to each find another two pledges. And in doing so ensuring the initiative grows exponentially. Let's let's go straight in then, Marcus, in your opinion, why should business leaders strive to protect the planet?
Marcus Hemsley:Because we've only got seven years, seven months, and about five days left to half global emissions. And if we don't according to the IPCC reports and all the world leaders at COP 26 last year, we have a very slim chance leaving a habitable planet for our children and grandchildren. So , this isn't just a nice thing to do. It's like future generations will look back that those of us in positions of power now in this decade and either go, thank goodness they took bold action or, we're living through hell and it's all their fault. So sorry to start with such a really kind of bleak answer, but that's just the truth. Like I'm literally reeling off what the top scientists are saying. We have to half global emissions. The problem is, they're going up again. So haven't even started coming back down. I mean, if we look at it me and you are both in business, Yiuwin, right. When someone comes to us, I mean, you're in sales and marketing, and so am I, and says, right. I want to double the size of my business, triple size of my business. So, yeah. Great. Cool. So let's break it down into a timeframe and have monthly targets. And I just don't see that at the minute, right now with global emissions, if we're gonna half them as a planet, that means we've got to be dropping them by about 6% a year at the minute and to put it in context in 2020, when everyone just stopped everything. Do you know how much global emissions dropped by any
Yiuwin Tsang:big wasn't it there's stories of like the smog lifting from Delhi and being able to see the Himalayas and everything...
Marcus Hemsley:The actual global emissions themselves only dropped by 5%. So every year we need to do pretty much an equivalent of what we did in 2020. Not directly. Of course, we're not all gonna hide in, in our houses, but we need to decarbonize rapidly. So this decade for everyone, doesn't matter if you're in business. Third sector, private sector, wherever you are. And you are in a position of power and influence. We need to be having this conversation. We need to be racing to zero emissions to halve it by 2030. And the clock is ticking.
Yiuwin Tsang:I think you've articulated that really well and whilst you say it's it's doom and gloom, it is a reality of it. As a founder of a business, as a leader of teams and as you say, people in position of influence, yes. It's our responsibility, right. To do what we can and to influence in the right way and Fountain has pledged to plant a million trees by 2025. That's obviously a really big number. Why do you think this was an important pledge for you and for your team.
Marcus Hemsley:Because it is ridiculously big. And what I mean by that is that a million trees when they grow up and over 25 years of the average lifespan every year, that will draw down enough CO2 to cover 50 businesses, the size of Fountain. So it's not just saying like, you know, let's cuz the other part of we've also pledged to get to the net zero by 2025. But also a million trees is much more impressive. And the reason is most people don't understand this about climate change like the media perpetuate this narrative that we all need to get to net zero. So it's halvened by 2030. And, but the truth is even if we stop dumping all CO2 and CO2 equivalent, into the atmosphere today, the planet's still in trouble. We're still on track for an inhabitable planet. Unless we draw down the 2.5 trillion, tons of CO2 out there. So there's really only two games in town, Yiuwin. Like game one is race to zero emissions. So people are starting to get that game. Two is the draw down game. So the reason we chose a million trees, it is a big, bold number that people can get behind. And I was one of the co-founders of the Million Tree Pledge. So the story behind that is, is quite interesting. It's one of the few good things that came out of COVID for me. So I had a really nasty case of COVID that I was in bed for five weeks, struggling to breathe, terrified. This was right back in March 2020. Terrified, 1, 1 in the UK. They put through to paramedic and they said, look, yes, you're struggling. I can hear your struggling to breathe, lots of people have this problem in the minute with this new virus, can you get to a mirror? And I was like, Okay. So we've got outta bed, got to mirror and they said, are your lips turning blue? And I was like, 'No,' and they said,'we're not gonna send a paramedic.' And at that point, honestly Yiuwin, I feel like it's in a horror movie, like within a few weeks there's new virus. That's out there I've caught it, I'm struggling to breathe. I don't know what's gonna happen. They're too busy. The ambulance can't come. I looked out the window and I thought, what's going on with the world? The planet can't breathe and I can't breathe. And, you know, when bad things happen, people say just take it one day at a time. If you're really sick, you should take it one minute at a time, right. Just get through the next minute. I'm feeling horrific. I'm terrified. And so I, I dunno if you've come across Ecologi.com, the tree planting platform, you know, those guys, brilliant. So I already had an Ecologi account and I thought here's an idea. To take my mind off it, every time I feel short breath, I'm gonna plant some trees and in a weird way, just doing a little bit of good when everything felt like it was horrible and going to hell gave me a little bit of hope in hell. And so is a fun game. I get planting trees and I thought this is quite interesting. Why don't I be bold and pledge to plant a million trees, so I thought, right. I'm gonna me, Marcus Hemsley, by the time I turn 40, I'm gonna have planted a million trees, which is, you knows big undertaking to it personally. And I thought, I wonder how many trees, we've lost in recent, centuries and looked it up and it was three trillion trees. So, an economist years ago during the financial crisis, explained to me a difference between a million and a trillion using time. And then you come across this. Right, but I'll do it with you now for anyone listening. So if me and you were gonna count to a million, how long do you think it would take, Yiuwin, Any ideas? Every second new number, right. So,
Yiuwin Tsang:Yeah, I don't know. Tell me, Marcus.
Marcus Hemsley:It's 11 days. Here's the interesting thing. If you were to count to a billion, it'd be 31 years, which means a trillion is 31,000 years. So there was my little million tree pledge. Which is 11 days. And the problem actually is the equivalent of 93,000 years. Cause it's 3 trillion trees, not one. So I thought, gosh, I need to find some more people to take this pledge. So. First place I went to was to the board of my company and said, alright guys, we're gonna plant a million trees. And they're like, gosh, how much is that gonna cost? And we looked up on Ecologi and at the time, it was 120 grand, like wow, okay. So, we don't have to do it all today. And then I thought, right. So those are the two levers of power. I have me, my personal spending and my business. And I thought, right, let's try and, find some like-minded people and, you know, started networking, asking the questions, the guys at Ecologi put me in touch with other businesses and we start the Million Tree Pledge. And the pledge is two parts. One is to pledge to plant a million trees by a set time. And the other is to find at least two other pledges. So it kind of grows exponentially. Someone described it as a leafy ponzi scheme, which, and I don't like the ponzi scheme bit, but it was this idea of it going viral and we, we launched just over a year ago on Earth Day and fast forward a year. We have 42 pledgers 42 million trees pledged and six and a bit 6.2 million trees in the ground already. So, we've got a nice little proof of concept and now we're just making lots of noise, but it's, it's kind of funny from my sick bed, you know, 2020 to like two years on. And we've got millions of trees in the ground and lots of people telling the story and a bit of momentum. So, and the idea is, is not to be really clear. Everyone who takes a pledge has to have a plan to race to the net zero. Like this isn't just offsetting or like just keep polluting and just plant trees to ignore the problem. It's not offsetting. It's drawing down and it's global reforestation. We fouled the nest, right? We say to our children, look. We as collectively, as people we fouled the nest, we've made a messy world for you, right? We just need to clean it up. We need to stop dumping pollution in the atmosphere. We need to draw down all the stuff we put up there and we need to put the trees back. It's quite simple. It's tidy to your room, quite frankly, you know, but tidy to your room. If you don't there won't be a habitable planet for you or my grandchildren or great grandchildren. And it's, it's pretty despicable, really? You think of how many billions of unborn people there are. We have the power to be good ancestors and we have to be good ancestors because we love our children and we will love the future generations as well. So we just put that love forward.
Yiuwin Tsang:You mentioned that in that BIMA Sustainability Council piece that you kindly sent on to me, and that was a line that I pulled out, which I absolutely love that concept of being good ancestors. And not just good, business people. And there's just this shortsightedness I feel. And I feel that's where so much of this stems from is and maybe this is systemic from quarterly, AGMs and, just looking to the next quarter, looking to the next quarter. But when we start talking generationally,
Marcus Hemsley:Yes,
Yiuwin Tsang:then it really puts into context just what a mess we've got ourselves into. And there's nobody else to blame. And it's about taking responsibility again, as you say, it's about, taking ownership of it and doing something about it.
Marcus Hemsley:Yeah. It's pure short termness and then if you look, sort scale up and helicopter view and say, well, you know, I mean, goodness, we've spent the 20th century trying to find something that semi works in terms of democracy in lots countries and getting people outta mass poverty. I mean, you take, obviously you take country like China. I mean the economic growth they've been through and everything you wouldn't want to deny that of people. But now we get to the 21st century and it's like... How do we make it sustainable now that most people in the world, I mean, it's, you've still got 9% in extreme poverty and that isn't acceptable. But if you look at where it has been in previous generations back, it is definitely like a lot of trends are going in the right direction, but unfortunately the trends are fueled by, carbon emission. So we need to balance that out, but I think you're right. The problem with the capitalism we have at the minute is it is looking at the quarterly reports and the short-termism and we sort that with the financial crisis and a number of things.
Yiuwin Tsang:No, indeed. I'm interested to know. So you're up to, did you say 40, 50 people at Fountain?
Marcus Hemsley:Including the founders. There's about, I think 45, 46 employees.
Yiuwin Tsang:So, substantial business there, 120 grand on building a forest of a million trees, isn't a small amount of money, so I'm interested on two parts on that is how did that conversation go with your board to say that I wanna plant a million trees and how did you handle that cause I imagine there would've been some real supporters in there, there might have been some neutral people in the room and there might have been some detractors in there as well. And then the other part of the question that I have for Marcus is how did it affect the broader team and what kind of contribution did they put into it and how did you kind of gauge their engagement with this particular initiative?
Marcus Hemsley:Yeah. The board discussion went better than I thought it would. 10 years ago people would've not been as convinced of the climate crisis and emergency, but I think really, we pledge to do it over four or five years, so it's around. 1% of revenue. I mean, for goodness sake. There's a wonderful organisation, 1% for the Planet. Like we're not asking a massive amount. Had it been 120 up front? Yeah. That would've been a harder conversation and, understandably there would've been more pushback. To answer, your second question in response to the team The thing that I loved actually and I wasn't expecting it. So we made a video and obviously we're still working remotely back then and everyone loved it. And I had about 12 people, I think write to me. People, I didn't think even were that bothered or that concerned about the climate crisis saying. I'm really terrified of this. I have children. I just worry about the future and to be part of a business that actually is giving that much money and leading the way with just encouraging others, to take bold action and draw down and educate on lifetime missions. Just, it makes me so proud to wanna be here. And actually the time when I think lots of people was changing jobs during the pandemic. There was a survey that came out famously like year and a bit ago saying 60% of people want to move jobs. Recruiters rubbing their hands a little bit. Our churn's been incredibly low and I think it's just. Thing is, it's funny when we first started Fountain, we really focused on culture. And I feel like in the last decade, culture was really big for people that were progressive. I think now it's a given, right? And I think now this decade is all about purpose over profit, and you attract the right people because of that. And then they bring people from their network and you just build a really solid team. So. It's done so well. And I don't think there was a business case for taking the pledge, but clients really responded well as well to talk about the other sort of people in the network, clients and prospects for just how we plant trees for every pitch we do and stuff that isn't really a gimmick it's to say, look, you know, we burn carbon to travel to your office and to use electricity to put together the pitch deck and stuff and all the rest of it and they just like it. And then also covertly introducing them to potentially joining the Million Tree Pledge. So we met with lots of positivity and even people who absurdly are skeptical of the science around climate change. No one I've met has got a problem with trees regardless where you sit on the political spectrum, trees tend to tick everyone's boxes. Now there is. Quite rightly questions about, should the money go into other things such as sea grass. And I think there's a strong argument for that, and I probably will be putting money towards sea grass to absorb carbon. And when the technologies there, I'd love to invest in direct air capture as well, because we just need to use all of these things, I'm not Mr. Tree lover, but there's some brilliant charities out there, for anyone wondering Ecologi uses a number of charities, but their main one is Eden Reforestation. So this gives money to people in areas where there have been rainforests. And these people tend to be in extreme poverty. They often tend to be women who, in some of those communities, don't often have the jobs and don't often hold the money. So there's so much stuff about transferring wealth from Britain and British agencies and British companies and putting it into, not for profits in places like Africa and Asia and, and South America in communities that have the least to help work on reforestation. It ticks a lot of boxes. And especially if it helps with female empowerment as well, that that can only be a good thing.
Yiuwin Tsang:Yeah, no, indeed. Indeed. It's this compound effect. Isn't it. As you kind of go on a certain direction almost there's this redistribution. We incredibly privileged aren't we in the west. And I think that's so important for us to take into context when we do these things that when we do, and we are in position of power and influence that, how can we create this compound effect of the good that we look to create in the world? So yeah, absolutely. Right. It'd be lovely to plant another, 350,000. Trees in some forest, in the burbs of, Kent or wherever it might be. But, there are other places in the world where they're acutely affected by climate change and things that, neglected. So it is so important. It's so good to hear. And. Also, it's really inspiring to hear the effect that it had on your team and the galvanization effect that it had as well and we talked earlier before on this call about these positive strokes and the idea of that. But I think that sometimes, especially with the pandemic and with the remote working hybrid working, and I know you guys are bringing people back into that lovely office that you've got as well. It's the, effect on mental health and perhaps that the mental wellbeing of our teams that you mentioned colleague of yours that said that something that terrifies him, there's a feeling really anxious about it. And they perhaps wouldn't articulate that otherwise had you not gone in the direction of making that pledge. And I would've kept that insight, and just externalizing is one step forward. And. Three steps forward is actually feeling I could doing something about it. Yes. Which is fabulous. And, again, really, , really positive to hear the effect that it's had on your clients as well. And the conversations that, that you have with your clients. I think I put in my, in my questions there, does it attract, does it kind of like draw out a certain type of. Person within the clients or even from prospects, that they see that you're making a positive impact. And it almost gives you that common ground straight away before you even get into pitch decks and commercials and things like this.
Marcus Hemsley:Yeah. Well, you know, what's funny is that it also seems to attract. Likeminded businesses and it also, raised a threshold of who we want to work with. There's an agency. I absolutely love, called Wholegrain Digital those guys, I don't know if you know Tom and Vinetta, from Wholegrain but they, they created the website carbon website and those guys are brilliant and they have an extremely high threshold. I mean, when I catch up with Tom he's like, oh, we turned away this company, this company's company. Cause they just, they won't meet. And I think that's. that's somewhere where we really want to get to is just say we only work for a certain type of person, but it's strange. I think you're right. You put out those things into the networks and then people know Fountain are doing this and, you know, they've helped up the really intrigue pledge. And then people who know other like minded businesses that have become B Corp and are interested in this sort of stuff, say, oh, you should chat to Marcus. And then naturally, we start using them as a supplier or vice versa, and it just, cause you start hanging around with similar types of people. It's something that you guys are trying to help facilitate as well, bring like minded people together. So it seems to happen naturally, which is, which is wonderful. Cause you wanna hand out with like minded people, then it almost becomes the norm because obviously, oh gosh, we really to taking this seriously because we're missing out on, you know, If you're not V Corp, if you're not, you know, doing something bold, like taking the million tree pledge, if you haven't got a science based plan to get to net zero, if you're not doing all these things, then you're not gonna be part of various conversations, jobs to be close to you. And that's kind of how it should be.
Yiuwin Tsang:Yeah. What I really love having this conversation with you, Marcus is looking at the website, looking at Fountain, and looking at your methodology, looking at things like your goal setting and your. Data planning and the KPI tracking and stuff like this. It's really methodical, which I really like. There's good systems I'm a big fan of systems and processes and the way that you're talking about it in terms of, you know, the science based plan of getting the carbon zero and things like this, it just feels like, you know what, typically speaking business people, founders they've got and. A really formidable set of skills. And that might be organizational that might be inspirational, might be communication, whatever might be, but it's how you apply those skills into things like making a difference, reducing your carbon and draw down, not just offsetting and so and so forth and applying this methodology and that, I think that's, that's absolutely fascinating. On that article that you shared with me, there's a couple of things that were on there. One of them that you mentioned. That, that good ancestors piece., and bringing down our own emissions. But the other one I thought was quite interesting. And you've touched on it briefly. There was influencing your world and mobilizing your customers just a little bit more into that.
Marcus Hemsley:Yeah. I mean, before I, you don't mind, I'll run through the five sort of pillars that there five steps, the BIMA Sustainability Council said everyone should do. So the first one says, look, just start somewhere. As we've got analysis paralysis. So do sign up to someone like Ecologi to buy carbon credits and start planting trees, just get the ball rolling. And then there's a free course that, James Cannings from MSQ has put together for people. You can do a free course with Future Learn, and it literally is all that modeling of how to measure your emissions and reduce them. So step two is measure. Step three is reduce. Step four is then go beyond. And that goes back to the thing I was saying about you. We've all got a collective responsibility to draw down our lifetime emissions and go beyond them. Right. Because, I mean, look, I really simply for an individual, like I'm 37, you know, you can times it by 10. So there's probably 310 tons of CO2 in the atmosphere that belongs to me. So that needs to come down, but I'm very privileged to be in a position I'm in. Right. So not everyone right now. Can afford to be buy planting trees, buying carbon credits, you know, doing all the stuff, buying electric car and all the rest of it. So like you need to actually go beyond and I need to cover those people. Like those of us in business need to cover businesses that can't afford to draw down their own emissions and so on. So that's where the go beyond piece comes from. And the final one, which is the question you asked is the influence your world is influence other people. It's mobilize everyone to do these other. Four like five steps basically. Cause if everyone I speak to, I say right, sign up somewhere like Ecologi start measuring, start reducing, have a clear plan to get to zero and then do something bold, like plant a million trees or do something to that effect. Like go way beyond just let's all start sucking down this carbon, you know, putting the trees back. And just getting more people. If I can mobilize as many people as possible to do that, then that compounds and they do it. So it's a similar mindset to the Million Tree Pledge. You take the pledge and you find at least two other pledges, you keep doing it because that's the only way we're gonna increase the probability of. Drawing down those emissions to get half cut by 2030, and then the rest, ideally, as soon as possible afterwards,
Yiuwin Tsang:it's interesting point that you just made there about, the fact that there will be businesses, there'll be parts of our communities and our society, even that just aren't in that position to be able to and perhaps less so these days, but you almost have these kind of binary conversations with people. You're either doing good or you're doing bad and the reality is that there needs to be a much broader view of this and there must be that bit around taking responsibility, taking ownership, and when we're in a position to. More of a difference. And rather than just dividing up the amount of carbon in the air and giving each person on the planet that to take on more and to have that bit so last bit on the section, Marcus, just in terms what you would recommend to other founders., and I wanna constrict this bit about getting teams involved because it sounds like it's had such an amazing effect over at Fountain what would your advice be, to getting teams involved in this piece around, , gearing your business to make a positive impact in protecting the planet?
Marcus Hemsley:So what we've done and I stole this idea from a lovely agency called Cayenne. So I'm not gonna try and hide it. Cayenne set up a sustainability squad. So we are doing a similar thing. And we found out our Head of People and Culture is also a bit of an eco warrior and he loves all this stuff. So I kind of want it to come from the team because I think depends on the size of the business. You know, small businesses, the founder is involved in a lot more the day to day, but also Fountain you know, the size we are. If it's just another thing that a founder is layering on, even though the guys are excited, then they'll look to me to execute it. And rather than it coming top down, we have a flat structure anyways, this is aligned with how Fountain do stuff. It's comes from the bottom up. It's like, alright, who, who wants be in sustainability squad? And we have 12 people want to be in it and they'll meet and they'll start. Right. Here's James's future learn course. And it's the sort of stuff that. Because it does take time and effort to, you know, to do some of these things. So what you wanna do is mobilize the people who are excited and then, you know, align it with their passions. So, the pay per click people we have who love spreadsheets. Well, they're gonna really enjoy doing the modeling stuff, right? The SEOs who are doing digital PR and content less, so right. But they might help write some articles, to help inspire some of our clients and do the fifth step. So it's getting everyone to do their bits that they enjoy. And then. Getting it to come from them rather than sort of, it's another thing that is work. And I think that's the tip to founders is, trying to, and you'd be surprised, you know, there are more people that signed up for sustainability squad than I thought we going to. So it's cool. But the other thing you can do as well is you, if you don't have someone like I've got, we've got great chap, Dickin and who's gonna take a lead with a lot of this. Who's an employee at Fountain. There are people offering their services to sort of part-time or fractional like chief sustainability officers to come in and help galvanise so you pay someone to come in, but the truth is if it sits on the founder's shoulders and I speak really from agency, world. Cause obviously that's why I know the best. It won't get done as quickly or as well as it could do, cuz Hey you is one founder to another, you know, we get pulled from pillar to post. So, you know, like, and I don't want the guys sitting there going well, Marcus talks good game, but why isn't some more stuff happening? It's kinda like right guys off you go run a, it play. They'll come with better ideas than I ever could. So that's the plan at least. Thanks so much Marcus Hemsley from the Fountain Partnership and the Million Tree Pledge, such an incredible session. It was humbling to find out about your inspiration to start the million tree pledge. And from all of us, at Beautiful Business, we hope you smash it out of the park.