From Climate Apathy to Action - One Pint at a Time with Adam Bastock | Episode 6

Today we’re joined by Adam Bastock, founder of Small99 and creator of People Planet Pint — a growing movement showing that real climate action starts with conversation, not complexity. Adam has spent the last few years helping small businesses take meaningful steps toward sustainability, proving that change doesn’t come from pressure or perfection, but from people coming together, often over something as simple as a pint in the pub.

In this episode, we explore why apathy is a bigger barrier than denial, how small businesses can lead the way, and why safe, open spaces for discussion matter. From People Planet Pint to tools like the Action Box card game, Adam shares a human approach to sustainability — built on community, curiosity, and the belief that a better future is already within reach.

In this episode:

• Meet Adam Bastock: Founder of Small99, helping small businesses take practical steps toward sustainability. 
• People Planet Pint: How informal, community-led events are sparking climate conversations across Europe. 
• Apathy vs Denial: Why inaction — not opposition — is the real challenge to overcome. 
• Small Business Power: How SMEs can move faster and drive meaningful change. 
• Designing for People: Why sustainability works best when it’s human, accessible, and imperfect. 
• The Action Box: Turning complex climate ideas into simple, practical actions. 
• Safe Spaces for Change: The importance of creating environments where people can talk, learn, and challenge ideas. 
• A Better Future, Now: Why progress is already happening — and how to be part of it.

The Ways to connect:

https://small99.co.uk/

https://small99.co.uk/people-planet-pint-meetup/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/adambastock/ 

Please like, subscribe or follow, so you're notified of any new episodes coming up, and if you're keen to reach Jon or Harry with any suggestions, feedback or comments, you can contact them via the show's LinkedIn page here: 

https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-growth-collective-uk

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:04

Would you say you're a curious person? Do you have a burning passion that not many people know about? Have you reached a cross rate in your personal life or career? This podcast is for you. Welcome to the gallery, a podcast for inquisitive minds from the Glaive Collective. I'm your host, Harry Maley, people, places, and purpose lead at Tyler Grange, an environmental consultancy. And I'm joined by co-host John Barry, managing director of Tyler Grange and founder of the Kindness Podcast. Each month we'll be talking with some incredible people to hear their stories and to learn from their experiences, to inspire your own personal growth and to ignite collective action. We can't wait to share these conversations with you. So let's begin. Do you find conversations around sustainability and climate action complicated? We don't feel they need to be that way. On this episode, we're joined by Adam Bustock, founder of Small99, creator of People Planet Pine, and somebody who has spent the last few years quietly proving that behavior change doesn't start with reports, targets, or guilt, but with conversations, community, and a decent pub. In this episode, we talk about why apathy is the bigger threat than denial, how small businesses can move faster than anyone else, and why sustainability only really works when people feel safe enough to talk, argue, laugh, and learn together. We explore the thinking behind People Planet Pint, the Action Box card game, and Adam's belief that a better future isn't hypothetical, it's already available if we design for people, not perfection. So whether you're deep in sustainability work, quietly curious, or just wondering where you fit into all of this, put up a chair and listen in. Well, thanks thanks for having me.

SPEAKER_02 2:00

Always a delight to speak to two lovely people. Oh, who's that?

SPEAKER_00 2:11

Before we um before we get started, Adam, what we usually do is give you a quick um quick workout. So non-physical, some quick fire questions. Most people refuse to answer them with yes or no or a definitive answer because we've purposely made them difficult for you. So we'll throw some at you. So do you prefer home or away?

SPEAKER_02 2:33

I'm glad because I did listen to one of the podcasts and I got this question. I was like, great, I've got some prep work, and I think it's going to be the same answer as some of the other ones, where I think it is a real balance of both, in that I really love travelling and enjoy getting on the train, disappearing to London for a week. But you can't beat that return to having a decent bed that isn't a very thin, like napkin that you're sleeping under in an easy hotel or in a travel lodge, and having an actual duvet. So yeah, I think the idea of travel is always more romantic. It very rarely is it staying in you know four-star beachside hotels, and it's normally running between uh Sainsbury's getting the meal deals. So yeah, I really love travel, but coming back to Glasgow and just having a place to actually be for several weeks at a time is good. But I think after six weeks I get the itch of wanting to leave again and go somewhere. So what we wanted to hear.

SPEAKER_00 3:26

No one so far is say, God, I hate being at home.

SPEAKER_02 3:28

Yeah, it's a bit worrying if they do, I think.

SPEAKER_00 3:31

It would be, wouldn't it? Okay, then tea, coffee, or herbal.

SPEAKER_02 3:36

Depends on the strategic need for the drink, I think. Um coffee is when I want to really get stuff done and I'm in a panic. Tea is my kind of go-to every day, and then herbal tea is normally evening window with an episode of Taskmaster or something.

SPEAKER_00 3:51

Sounds perfect. Next one, I can't guess for you actually this one, whether you're slips slippers, socks, or barefoot kind of person.

SPEAKER_02 3:59

Yeah, I really like this question when I heard it. I was like, I don't understand that. Um socks. I think socks all the way. I I slippers are again strategic in in Glasmegan Winters. There's a level that I kind of it has to hit a minimum before I go, right, we'd now we're now going to the next kind of DEF CON level of cold, and therefore I need to get slippers out of the cupboard. So socks, socks are normal, yeah. My normal state of being, I would say.

SPEAKER_00 4:25

I agree actually. I think slippers can be dangerous. The amount of times I've nearly had a life-changing accident on the stairs in slippers, it's like it's just not worth the risk.

SPEAKER_01 4:34

Yeah, that's surely the re the real reason for them being called slippers.

SPEAKER_00 4:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 4:40

Actually slipping on and slipping off, but out of them is the issue.

SPEAKER_00 4:43

Yeah, yeah. And conscious of you telling us you're in Glasgow, uh, North, South, or Midlands?

SPEAKER_02 4:52

It's a it's a tough one. So I grew up in rugby in the Midlands. Uh then I moved to Brighton for several years, well, for about ten years on the south coast, and then now I'm in Glasgow. So I've not done the north, and I think that's the thing is people always say the north, but if you ever want to annoy someone in Manchester, always say, How's the weather down south? Um you're on a call with them, because technically correct, but they get very annoyed by it. Um I I don't I think I really struggle. I think I really love being in Glasgow and the city, but I do think that like the South, you just really can't get good ales in Scotland. It's a bit of an issue. And so like the pub culture in the South is unbeatable. And I think like living in Brighton and just being able to get a train out to a little village somewhere and like do a massive walk around the South Downs, end up back at the pub, have like a three percent ale or something, and then a nice meal, and walk, walk back to the train station or walk home from there, it's just not something you can do in Glasgow because you get a train to the Highlands and then it's like a three-day walk back to the nearest pub, and so it's all just much more remote and bigger. Um, so yeah, it's a really difficult one that is. I feel quite politically charged and I'm quite nervous about answering in any definitive way. But you can't.

SPEAKER_01 6:09

If you're listening to this, if you're listening to this and you're an ale drinker in Scotland and you need to put put Adam in touch with where he can get some decent ale, then do do send him messages on LinkedIn.

SPEAKER_02 6:21

Well, I've I've got the the thing is that the the pub that I know that we go to all the time that has got really good ales, it's closing. So this is the the issue is that there's not that many of them in Glasgow. And I love tenants as much as the next person, but sometimes I just want a sessionable ale.

SPEAKER_00 6:36

I once had a really good Tunnox tea cake stout in in Scotland is amazing.

SPEAKER_02 6:43

That's great. Top tip for um Tunnox tea cakes is pop them in the freezer uh and then you get a nice crunch on the marshmallow sort of inner afterwards. So you're gonna try that tonight. Life-changing.

SPEAKER_00 6:55

Okay, moving on. Uh mornings or nights, what's your preference?

SPEAKER_02 6:59

Nights. I very much am an evening person. I think like it's it's weird when like looking at your energy levels and how I sort of plan the day of going when are we gonna get stuff done? So I get up relatively late, like sort of like eight-ish. I will then start work at nine till three, three o'clock's when my energy levels start to dip, and then it's about half six, seven, I'll come back online and feel like I can do more work again, and I'll get like a second wind and work seven till sort of ten thirty-ish. And then yeah, normally bed at midnight. So I think that that sort of evening session is always where I felt very active and alive.

SPEAKER_00 7:35

Yeah, same actually. This might answer the next one, then whether you're a party animal or a pamperer, or a bit of both.

SPEAKER_02 7:42

I I don't I think, yeah, party I'm not sure. I think party animal might be a stretch, but I think but yeah, more on the party side than on the pamper. I've never done a spa thing or done anything particularly pampery. Um definitely think partying.

SPEAKER_00 7:56

I guess my idea of pampering is an evening in a nice local pub anyway, so you know.

SPEAKER_02 8:02

Yeah, I think that's a good that's a good that would be it. That in like a I don't know, it's a very clear image I've got of my head of like low ceilings, big kind of leathery chairs and ales and a pub quiz going on. Perfect.

SPEAKER_00 8:16

And the last one, which is the one that always, you know, people refuse to choose because it's so inextricably linked, is whether you would go for nature or people if you had a choice.

SPEAKER_02 8:29

This is the thing, I I don't think this is particularly difficult for me. I would go people every time. I think nature's great, obviously. I'll caveat it with that. Love it, big fan. Um but uh yeah, I don't think you could beat a room full of people. I think I really am a people person, so I've had it before where I've had like a day alone and like on the 25th hour I am like I need to go and talk to people, be somewhere. I can't do like a retreat of going away into a forest for three days. I'd just be like, no, I need to get out to get back to the city.

SPEAKER_00 9:03

I'm glad you said people actually, because it leads us neatly into people planet pints. It would have been really disappointing if you just said, Yeah, nature can't stand people. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 9:13

So uh I built a rough road back then.

SPEAKER_01 9:18

Really does. Um I suppose just just before we get into um what you're up to now, it would be really good to hear a little bit about your about your background and um before Small 99 came to be, you know, where where did your sort of journey start in the in the professional sense?

SPEAKER_02 9:38

Hmm. So it was actually when I was so when I moved to Brighton sort of when I was about 20, I think. And so one of the first jobs I had was working for a small cartoonist called Modern Toss, who are fantastic and I'm a big fan of them still. Um they did great work, and I think that really did define a lot of the tonal shift of my career, and I was only there for like 18 months. But once you've got people ringing up from Private Eye swearing at you on the phone in a very positive way, it does sort of have an impact at that age. It's very formative. Um, so that's where I started. Like I was doing their kind of e-commerce stuff. So I was working in marketing, I rebuilt their websites, and then I had several jobs after that where I was doing similar things uh in in the South East, sort of for companies, helping them on Google Ads, uh SEO, e-commerce, Shopify, all that stuff. So building their uh presence online and doing digital marketing, and then was doing that until about 2019 where I was like, well, either I turn this into a proper company, whatever that means, uh, and do like more of an agency thing and try and scale it, or I try and do something different and scale that instead, and that's when you know it was it's never as clear-cut as it sounds in these podcasts of of life-changing events. But you know, probably two years I drifted over different ideas and had always had an interest in sustainability anyway, but it was always a interest, it was never a professional thing, and then I was like, Do you know what this might be the time to do something about it and actually shift into you know the impact space or whatever you want to call it. I never quite know how to define it, but yeah, this sort of world of doing good and doing good with people, and I think the people thing is a really good question because I think that's where I was always like I want to do something which builds a community and has a sense of community around it, and even when I was doing digital marketing in SEO within in kind of Brighton, that was always very much active in co-working spaces and hosting events and doing a lot of the stuff that and you know, building that friendship group that uh set the foundations. Um, so yeah, coming out of digital marketing, I also realized that I was working mostly with small businesses and how quickly they could move, in that if I sent them a quote on via email, I could have a response within an hour and they'd be like, right, just go and get on with it. And I thought, how do we harness that energy for sustainability? And if we are truly in that race to net zero, how do we enable those people who can move the fastest to help us win that race?

SPEAKER_01 12:01

That's interesting. So actually you were drew to smaller businesses, them being we say, maybe agile, nimble, like it's fast-paced, reactive. Um did you was it did your experiences uh before this of larger organizations um sort of put you off working with them then?

SPEAKER_02 12:22

Did you did you think that that they would be maybe hesitant to change or I think that's a bold assumption to think that I have any experience with large organisations is probably the answer.

SPEAKER_01 12:31

Well, there's no absolutely, yeah. Uh just interesting, you you you specifically focus on small organisations, so I presume you had some sort of opinion.

SPEAKER_02 12:40

Uh yeah, I don't know. It's it's a really good one, and I think I don't know whether it's a strength or a weakness to like looking at it from a career perspective, because looking at some of the people I see working with large organisations, it just seems so alien. Because I I've never worked in that sort of corporate environment and therefore don't really know how to operate in that world, and I've always known that smaller business. Which is great from an ethical point of view, but terrible from a financial point of view, I'll tell you. Um so I think sounds great. Bank balance does not reflect it. So I think that's where like the small business thing is always I'd always worked with them, and they were very easy to work with. It was, you know, I always had a role of never work with arseholes, and that has always stood me in good stead of just people who are good who are doing good things, and it it feels like you're working with friends a lot of the time. Um and I'd never had the experience of working in a particularly large organization. Like, you know, in that first ten years of working, I think the biggest company I worked with had about 30 employees. Like they were they were really small. Um and it was great, they were doing great work. You know, the these were quite these were companies that were punching above their weight, they were nationally known brands, or they were you know leaders in their sector, but they were just quite small, quite niche, and and and didn't uh have that sort of wider impact. So yeah, the large business thing, I just never really had any engagement with it.

SPEAKER_00 14:01

So I guess linked to that, I mean in terms of small businesses that you're working with, and I guess the topic of sustainability and how that's changed. Um I mean, when you started to deal with people, did you feel that it was a s a sense that people still felt alienated, scared, or misunderstood what sustainability meant? Because all the small business owners I still meet myself actually still feel feel that actually they can't make a difference to the small business. But I'm right, I'm always like, you really can as a small business, and actually it's because they're looking at some of the outputs and marketing material from larger businesses and some of the political messages that they're receiving that puts them off. But you know, it's a really important message to them, isn't it? That actually starting small, making those small changes, really can make a difference and can influence other small businesses, which collectively has a huge impact.

SPEAKER_02 15:02

And that was always the sort of driving idea, but I think that's the danger of pedestalling people like Patagonia, where you go, well, of course they can do great stuff in theory because they are a multi-billion pound dollar you know entity. Um doesn't mean they're doing bad work, but I don't think it's particularly helpful to then look at them and say, what can we learn from this? And I think from the small business point of view, I think they just don't feel it. And that's the biggest gap, really, is most small business owners understand they can make quick moves, but that they're they're gonna be focused on much bigger, more pertinent issues of survival and growth or whatever it means to them. And it's not until they start feeling like sustainability is sudden that they have a have an ability to benefit from or have uh action in that they're actually gonna really engage on that. So I think that's been always been the challenge, and that's what made me kind of move into the space a little bit was when I was researching that sort of 2019, 2020-ish, when I was like, okay, I want to do something in sustainability, what role could I play in that, and how do I, you know, read re reinvent my career to a certain extent? It was just the fact that a lot of the research I was doing, I was like, I don't recognise any of this. Like, I'm I think I'm a relatively intelligent person trying to read these documents, and I do not understand them. I do not understand what the outcome is. There's no action here, it is all reporting aligned. There is no actual tangible tactile sort of action plan, or there is an action plan there, but it just feels very top-level and wishy-washy and and and doesn't really actually demonstrate the practical what do I do with this in the next seven days type thing. And that's what started to form like underpin the entire 99. Is going, oh, how do we start taking some of the knowledge from those documents and converting them into real language so that it actually means people can decide what they can do within the next hour rather than it being something that's like, well, you know, here's a way to decarbonize your supply chain. And you go, What the fuck does that mean? Like, you know, what what does that actually mean to my business? Um, in terms of day-to-day, what does that look like and what does that feel like? And I think that's really what marketing, my marketing background is bringing to this a lot, and that gets overlooked by a lot of sustainability professionals. Is that case of what does this feel like? Um, and a lot of small business owners quite often it feels scary because it is technical, it is people attacking you for not doing the right thing, it is tied up in language that you've never seen before and have never experienced, and therefore the feeling is one of isolation and terror, rather than a feeling of oh, I feel like I'm having a difference and I can you know redo something, which I think, and it's not a bad thing at all, but like things like um tree planting are a great starting point, but often for many businesses the end point because that is as far as they feel they are willing to go, because planting trees on a day out feels good, which is great, same like litter picks and stuff. But as soon as you go, Well, you can actually there's material changes you can make to your business here that are gonna have an impact and create those ripple effects, that that's a much harder thing to sell is a feeling that is gonna be positive.

SPEAKER_01 18:04

And I suppose if if you're a if there's a small business owner listening to this now, what would you say is something tangible that they could explore that's within their within their means that's gonna have more of an impact than perhaps a token day out, which is still still valuable in itself, particularly for culture purposes, but yeah, but I I think it is having the I would say it's having the conversation all the time, and there's a slight bias here, but from like four years of me training small like thousands of small businesses in this, it is that this isn't a uh this this has to be something that you look at regularly with the entire team, and the team have to feel ownership over it.

SPEAKER_02 18:46

It can't be a shiny thing that you do once a year. Um that is great, it's a good thing to do, as you say. Doing a tree planting day is great. I'm not trying to attack that to take my own sort of advice, but you know, I think that's still really good to do. However, that is not gonna materially improve your business from a commercial sense, that is not gonna change the culture of your organization, which makes you build a uh momentum of action within the business by everyone feeling empowered on that, and therefore a lot of those actions to get to that point are gonna be a little bit not uncomfortable, but I think it's not gonna be that buying some new software is gonna do it, it's that you might have to go, do you know what? We're gonna spend two hours this afternoon just thinking about what we can do next and just make the space for it.

SPEAKER_00 19:29

I guess your skill, therefore, is like is facilitating, educating, and communicating in a way which makes those changes feel safe. I mean, we've fallen victim of it ourselves, I guess, as we've grown over a hundred people as a B Corp and our own supply chain, which are largely ethical B Corps and small businesses. I know that even the first time we sent out our supplier questionnaire, we probably didn't do it correctly and we didn't enter into enough communication around it, and it freaks some people out because all of a sudden they're like, Tyler Granger asking us all these questions and using all this language that we don't understand. We only raise coffee beans around the corner. What what what why do we need to fill this in? And we realised we'd done the thing that we'd criticised in the past. We'd just we'd we'd raise sustainability questions with no context and no clear communication strategy and yeah, got it wrong. And I guess you're you're you're doing a great job at making that feel safe for people.

SPEAKER_02 20:34

Trying to, but I think it is still difficult because to get people to that point is quite a long journey. And I think that's that's always been the challenge of going actually the reason why people send the questionnaire is because that's quite an easy task. Do we get ticked off your to-do list? Um and and rarely do you think of the other person receiving that because how many times have you received a questionnaire and been delighted by it? Like it it's a great another thing for me to do which I don't want to do, and it's gonna take me several hours of my life to answer questions. Like, who no one no one's gonna be delighted at that, which is why I think it needs to be handled quite I don't know, delicately is the right word, but I think you do need to be more empathetic with it of go, well, actually, what are we asking for the other from the other person here? And so, like we've helped a few corporates with their supply chain engagement days and their workshops, where it is much more of that hosting the conversation, and you do have to start off with some very vague broad questions and go, like, look, I've done the scope three reporting, like well not scope three reporting, but I've done like the scope three analysis of carbon footprints. I've done B Corp impact assessments at a very top level, you know. I know a lot of the technical knowledge and information there, but I would never use any of that language upfront. It's very much a right, let's get some post it notes. What what's your biggest priority as a business right now? What's blocking you from making progress on that business priority? And then through that, you frame it all in the sustainability lens without them ever realizing it. And that's sort of what the way you need to approach it, because then they Are led to that answer themselves and they believe it themselves rather than if you go in and and go, right, I need you to do this, this, and this, you're immediately going to be met with some sort of defensiveness. And typically, those people are not going to be against sustainability actions. Like, we've run thousands of workshops. I've had like two climate deniers out of all my time doing that, and I think we spend too much time worrying about the deniers, and it's like, no, it's everybody else who wants to do stuff, but the way that you're trying to engage them is through questionnaires, another software platform, more spreadsheets, and you're not actually helping them or aligning with their business objectives at all. So why would they bother doing that?

SPEAKER_01 22:38

Yeah, yeah, it's a really it's a really good point, and I and I suppose there's there's sort of this misconception, I think, that by working more sustainably, you you're somehow slowing slowing business down. You know, you're you're you're putting barriers in the way of doing doing business. But I wonder if you're in your experience, have you seen this actually have a positive impact on on growth or or resilience with these businesses that you've worked with?

SPEAKER_02 23:09

I definitely have. However, I also think we do fall into the same trap of it can be a bit cherry-picked in these stories. So I'm always a bit cautious of hearing myself and going, I've been possibly saying the same thing for four years, and it's all very nice, and is it a bit bullshit? Um, but there are companies I've spoken to recently who have won new contracts and tenders as a result because they're not being caught themselves, but they're the the way that they're aligned and the actions they've taken on like um like electric vans or decarbonisation stuff has meant that they're much more competitive, one from a cost point of view, because now they can get solar panels and charge their electric vans and they don't have the issue. But then, secondly, you know, they're seen as a good business to do work with, and therefore they're winning contracts with other B Corps who are then recommending them, and then it's that word of mouth. I don't necessarily think that is a sustainability thing. I think that is more of just a good brand storytelling marketing thing of going, well, do you know what? If you're a good business and you're people want to work with you, people are gonna refer you and you're gonna give in more business as a result. I don't think it has to be new, and I do think there is still a chasing of this, oh, if we just put sustainability into a commercial context and it will suddenly win and we'll meet net zero tomorrow, which is just it it's still a bit naive, I think. And I say that as someone who falls into that trap quite regularly, because I'm still seeing messages on LinkedIn from brands that are doing good work that we saw in 2021, and it just feels a bit like we're still saying the same things and trying to pat each other on the back. And I don't really know what the answer to that is, but yeah, I agree actually.

SPEAKER_00 24:40

I mean, you're really good on LinkedIn, I must admit, in terms of um offering that balance and also offering some positivity or reality, I would say. Uh what I really like that you do is that you yeah, you'll present things in a in a clear way when the story says otherwise. I've seen you do that on numerous news articles, and I can think I think it might have been Naomi Klein, the author, that said something like in the politics hates hates a vacuum. If it isn't filled with hope, it's filled with fear. And I think actually being positive in the good stuff that is happening and giving it the right platform, or changing the angle to the news to say, yes, there might be issues with energy supply in the UK, but look how much of the energy supply in the UK actually is from a renewable source so far this year. I think you're really good at offering that correction. So again, is that something that you seek out? Do you look for those articles? Do you look for that news feed and think actually I'm gonna put a different spin on this? Is it is it that because you feel a duty to do that, or is it just because you like to change this balance?

SPEAKER_02 25:53

Just makes me angry, I think, is probably the honest answer. It's just it's the whole thing of you know, don't get angry, get even. And this is me trying to get even, I think. Um but I think this has generally been a bit of a soul-searching thing over the past few sort of six months, really, of going actually why aren't why are we doing this? Why are why am I still running small 99? There's plenty of illogical reasons why not to to a certain extent. Um could you go work at a corporate job and probably make more money? But I think there's something around that driving, and I'm still searching for this, but I think it is the thing that annoys me is when people don't believe that a better future is possible now. And there's something around that, which is what's distilling it around that of going, well, and even this week we've had people be like, Well, you know, it's not sunny in the UK. And it's like, what are you talking about? 30% of the electricity being used right now is coming from solar panels, and that's discounting, that's just from the grid, that's not on what's on people's roofs, because that's not hitting the grid and not being measured at all. So what it's just it's just incorrect, and it is it's not even ignorant. And I think it's the that's where I get angry because those aren't people who are saying solar panels don't work. They're not people who are saying this is all woke nonsense or we shouldn't be targeting net zero. These are people who support the transition, but they're just sending that message out in the wrong way and they're being very apathetic. And I think apathy is the biggest enemy we have in this, in that that is what's slowing us down. Is it's not the people, it's not the deniers who are the minority, it's the people who are like, well, maybe, but not quite yet. And like we're seeing that right now in the past two weeks, like 2026, we've already hit more solar power generation in the UK than we did at the peak last July, and we're you know, we're only in April, so that's already gone. That record fell the next day, where it went from 14 gigawatts to 14.4 gigawatts on on an April like afternoon, and then that's also then accelerating the the adoption of it because of what's going on with the energy crisis again at the minute, where like uh inquiries for renewables has just doubled for a lot of companies overnight. That's what's frustrating to me is that why is it taking this to get to that point of doubling it? And I know that makes sense because the payback periods are now shorter, the payback periods were already pretty good. So there's sort of a frustration there of going, well, why didn't all the people who are in remote communities on oil heating have a heat pump installed in solar panels a year ago? What was stopping them from that, and how do we identify that and try and unblock that part? Because I think that's what's the frustration is is that is possible very quickly and is possible, it is possible now. That better future is is is available, so what why aren't we doing it? And quite often it's it's either misinformation or just lack of information where people don't think about it. And I see it in my friend group, and I think that's outside of this space, there's a lot of people there who just don't think that smart meters are worth getting or that battery storage isn't real, and it's like there's at least 10 gigawatts, whatever it is, of battery storage on the grid right now. People are still saying, well, the technology's not quite there yet.

SPEAKER_01 28:46

It's just because it doesn't it's fascinating because I think you know our energy is energy generation and it it's so politicized, and actually I see I see this divide as well in less so maybe in friendship groups, um, but even within our within with our sort of family group, you know, there's this this is a quite quite a generational divide with regards to attitude, and I think part of that is it's change, it's different. Um perhaps a bad rep back in the day, technology's changed, those early adopters had less positive experiences, we've learned a lot, but also you know, there's their source of news and information. Oh, uh compared to mine, it's it's going to be different. There's a different narrative there. I mean, uh you're absolutely right. This this technology is is available, and I've I've been spent I've been spending the last couple of weeks um digging a trench between my between my house and a um another part of the garden uh in in preparation of having an air an air source heat pump installed. And um but I I know that's I'm I'm in a privileged position to be able to do that, but making full use of a government grant. Um I think it's going to improve my energy bill, uh, as well as do something which I know is far less uh damaging to the environment. So I think it's you know but even if you're just doing it for financial reasons, ultimately, um that the incentive is there.

SPEAKER_02 30:13

I think so, but I think this is where I've seen really our role is not in some people ask always say like always small a consultancy, or like, is that what you're doing? And I'm like, well, no, because I don't want to have to be the person that's writing the technical reports on what a solar heat pump, uh air source heat pump can reduce your emissions by. Like, that I don't really that's not what actually moves or drives change. I think what I'm seeing more and more we're moving towards is how do we design experiences that change behavior within organizations at scale, ideally as well. So that's where the idea of the action box came from, which is a kit you can buy and run with your team, but the methodology and the design behind it is that that will lead to learnings and behaviour change that people will act on and they will never realize that they acted on that as a result of that workshop, and that it's using those sort of psychological nudges or behaviours to really drive that and embed that behaviour change in, and that's where that the LinkedIn stuff comes from as well, is it's just repositioning stuff in a different way, and I think that a lot of that is coming from that marketing background to a certain extent, because you know, people don't buy cars because it's been they've been given a report that says uh it's gonna reduce their emissions or it's gonna reduce their mileage per year by an extra two percent or whatever it is, which is what we try to go. Oh, if we just had a report for this, we'd then act on it. And it's like, well, no, people buy very silly cars that are very expensive all the time, even though a Highland II-10 is what they actually need in terms of their use case that a report would suggest to them. But you know, that business owner is gonna go and buy a brand new Range River because it makes them feel cool, or they're gonna go buy a brand new, you know, Porsche Taycan because it's it's cool and electric, and therefore they they're buying a status of someone who owns something that their other friends at the golf club don't have. And that's a sort of bit that's missing from a lot of this is what's the status gain? What is the the real driver in in behaviours that's gonna make people actually shift rather than it just being seen as a sort of the right thing to do or whatever that is.

SPEAKER_00 32:12

Before we uh move on to the action box and People Planet Pine, I guess one more question around this that I'll be interested in is whether you're seeing small businesses making a conscious decision to not talk about the stuff they're doing, the good stuff they're doing because of the I guess the highlighted concerns around greenwashing. Uh obviously the advertising standards authority have tightened up their stance on it, as have lots of other uh organisations such as B Corp. Um, and they've actively moved to green hushing, some people think, where people are just like, I'm not gonna say anything because it's likely to be wrong. Um have you seen any evidence of that or fear of that? Or again, do you think that's been been made to be a bigger issue than it needs to be?

SPEAKER_02 33:02

No, I think that that is one where I probably think that is the bigger issue, and I think that is the biggest issue. I think the way we're going about it probably is still a little bit wrong, where I think we're still stuck in the idea that, well, those businesses need to pay a consultant to come and write a report for them, um, to to then say that with confidence. Where in reality it's like, no, get them in the pub for six months and then they'll start talking to other business owners, and that's what will give them confidence, but we'll come on to that. Um so I think that's where it is the I don't really have any concrete examples, this is a little bit vibe-based in terms of a response, but I do think it is businesses were always quite cautious. People started to understand the commercial benefits of if they were to talking about this, that they could um see the the increased kind of consumer interest or or whatever, and they sort of got that, but I think there was still a natural hesitancy of going, yeah, but it is still easier if we just don't say anything, and there's a there's a risker version there that was quite strong. I think that's changing in certain sectors where if they are like in NHS supply chains, MOD supply chains, or whatever it is, there is slightly more of a clear benefit there of going, well, for this tender, you need this sort of uh demonstration of action, and therefore we prefer suppliers with that. So in a B2B setting, I think it's a lot easier, and people are moving away from that. However, I'd say that people are still very, very reticent to put any of those statements publicly. So they'll they will have them internally, but that's where the green hushing comes in, is that they're probably doing quite ambitious stuff, but they're staying silent. And I think you see this just within Glasgow, where there's a lot of really good stuff going on within businesses, and we've been part of the Step Up to Net Zero program where we're helping it's about 200 businesses we've helped through the Chamber of Commerce. Um, and I've been like an accessory to that program, not the core part of it, but like there's been a lot going on there. We've we've seen a lot of the actions happen, which has been great. But that your main thing you see is reticence to actually talk about that at a wider level, and a lot of the events where we're doing like the people who are then being spotlighted for events on sustainability, it's still what I would call the usual suspects, which are the early adopters, the movers who really baked it in, went early, went and made it very public. But there's not been that many people to sort of challenge them or replace them uh at the scale because a lot of people are like, Well, I don't really want to put my head above the parapet, we'll just keep going as we are.

SPEAKER_00 35:17

Yeah, I've seen it in hospitality, which is again an industry under pressure, a small uh a small restaurant chain. I think they've got five restaurants, and they were pretty open and honest that they'd taken out all the plastic plants from their premises and replacing them with living plants. They'd spoke about the cost of that. They talked about the original decision to put fake plants in. So they they they explained it all really well, but they they got pretty attacked uh in the news and on radio interviews for not being responsible in the first place. And to me, again, it it it wasn't the right approach. It was the the honesty thing that they were doing was saying we got this wrong, we've improved it, this is the cost of that. Um they told a really good story, in my opinion, but I could hear that other businesses listening would be like, why? Why talk about it if this is a response?

SPEAKER_01 36:13

Totally, just setting yourself up for a world of pain, like sort of yeah, horrible. And it sort of distracts from maybe what their core purpose is all about, anyway. And is is that helpful distraction? Um, it's very easy to jump on the bandwagon and um and play the blame game, isn't it?

SPEAKER_02 36:30

So I I think but I think that goes back to that emotional sort of empathy part of going, well, what are they feeling? Because you know, as of April this year, minimum wage has gone up. Um there's increased energy costs on hospitality, there's the EPR uh legislation, which is the extended uh packaging responsibility or producer responsibility, uh, around like so takeaways now have to use certain uh materials, which is probably going to put a bit more of the cost up. So, and hospitality wasn't famed for being a particularly awash with uh cash and high margins already. So when you're dealing with then sheer survival and there's more stuff coming down the road, why would you then take the the extra risk of, as you say, going on local radio and saying that you've got review plastic plants, and then people are like, Well, why did you have them in the first place? And it's like, well, that's not as you say, that's not the story here. Um, the story is that we've just spent however many thousands of pounds replacing them. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 37:23

So talking of being down the pub, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 37:26

I was gonna say, this is the moment I've been waiting for. Uh People Planet Behind. I mean, it's been such a huge success, and the the scale of growth that it's had is is pretty staggering, I think. Considering you only started it, what was your first one in 2021?

SPEAKER_02 37:47

Yeah, so that was the first one that we paused for six months because of Omicron funds.

SPEAKER_01 37:52

Yeah, and you're and you're now in over what a hundred cities?

SPEAKER_02 37:57

Yeah, locations, not all cities, locations.

SPEAKER_01 38:01

It's just staggering. Yeah, tell us about how how do people Planet Pint come to be?

SPEAKER_02 38:05

Well, see, it's been really this sort of was what I was saying earlier around that I've always been someone who's tried to bring people together, and I think this is where it came from. Around I knew that I was going to a lot of events during COP26 in Glasgow, uh, and it was a lot of great panel sessions, and you'd look around the room, and half the world was there, and you would never get to speak to anybody. There would be a 40-minute panel session with four people. Um, oh I'm gonna rant about my thoughts on panel sessions, and then after that, you kind of you you leave the room and that's it. You go and find the next event, and then you go and sit in front of another four people on stage with a room full of 200 people that you never speak to. And I was like, this is bullshit. I want to go and have a pike with some people and just chat to them and go, is what I'm hearing on stage true? Do you believe on you know, do you do you agree with that? Is that going far enough? Is that saying the real thing? So I just booked a pub right next to the train station and got yeah, uh put a post on LinkedIn and did a bit on um by some of the apps that are around Cocktailistics at the time, and we've got about 40 people turn up. And so that was the first one where we went, right, there might be something in this, this is interesting, that was fun. This is probably quite a good way for me to make friends because I'd only just moved to Glasgow at the time, and then paused for six months, started it again, and then people on LinkedIn just started messaging me saying, Can I set one up in my city? I was like, sure. Here's how it works, I guess, and then just sort of made up the processes, and then it was sort of this time last year, so going into 28-25, we're a bit like okay, this is starting to break slightly. Um, because we had reached that scale where we were running, you know, we still are now about 70 events a month, and the admin toll of that kind of on the back end was was quite significant in in kind of just hours of orchestration, so then we just spent a lot of time rebuilding it. But it was very organic in terms of I think we just hit on this. I don't know if it was gap in the market's the right phrase, but there was a gap in the experience of people in the sustainability profession where there was no informal space for them to go and hang out. Uh, it was all because I think it was an impact-driven space, it was all this has to have an impact, this has to be a panel session where we then walk away with deep meaning or actions, or we need to go and learn something or do a presentation, or yeah, like have a workshop or whatever it was. And I was just like, well, no, just go and have a pint and chat to people and then see what happens. And that's where we've seen that that action happen of going, well, for us to get a business into a workshop's very difficult, but for us to get a business into the pub, I felt like it was a bit easier because it's after work, it's not competing with their actual sort of daily hours, they might just be in need of a bit of decompression time after a busy week. And if you do that repeatedly and get them into the pub for six months, you don't know who they're going to meet and who they might start collaborating with, and that's probably gonna lead onto their action much more successfully because they're being surrounded by people who might be further along the journey than them. And that's what we're trying to design now, or look at like how is that working in the we we call it the kind of the light greens and the dark greens. So the light greens being people who are perhaps climate curious but haven't really acted on it, the deep greens might be your sort of extinct rebellion activists and people who are really really passionate, and there's a scale there, right, of people on that spectrum. And by having those people who are slightly darker green in the room, the the the light green business owner coming in is then being surrounded by ideas that they may not have had exposure for to. And to that you know, previous point of that's going to be much more impactful than them having to write an impact report or be being asked for their uh credentials from a from a supplier or something like that. I think it's much it's a much more impactful way for people to realise that it can feel better, that a better future can look real and it can feel tangible and possible and isn't a requirement, it is a sort of aspirational thing that they can reach for.

SPEAKER_00 41:54

Yeah, I think that's um I mean I've experienced it firsthand. I remember one of the first people, Planet Pints I went to in Manchester. I think it gave me that prompt to remember that I'm coming at sustainability from a certain angle, and actually I was suddenly in a room with like a poet, a student activist, a corporate leader, and then other small business owners, all with a slightly different perspective on the same issues, and we had a really good open chat, and small business would be really open and honest, saying to me, How do we how do we get on your supply chain? Um and it was just really interesting, it was a real leveller, and it was a real educator of actually. I'd forgotten that I was so obsessed with how we were dealing with sustainability in Tata Grange. I've forgotten what those issues meant to other people, particularly students, actually, the younger people I've met at People Planet Pine are great at both holding you to account, giving them their perspective on things, but also reminding you that we have got a responsibility for multi-generations. So yes, definitely definitely achieved its goal, Adam. I guess I'd ask linked to that is how do you, you know, have you did you work on the framework of what would happen at them, or as you say, were you very open in terms of like find a venue and do this and let it happen?

SPEAKER_02 43:18

I I think I it was quite actively pushing back against people who wanted to turn it into something that was facilitated, and I was like, within reason you can sort of do that, but really the aim is no, be sit in that uncomfort, be uncomfortable, and just get six people or ten people or thirty people into a room and just let them talk to each other and see what happens. And I think that was what we had to train a few of the hosts to do a little bit in the early days was that you don't need to try and make this a thing. This is just get people into the room and uh and do stuff. We've kind of l eased off a little bit on that more recently, because after like three, four years of meeting up, some of the the cities have wanted a little bit more of a structure, or the attendees have wanted a bit more. maturity in their in their sort of knowledge because they've gone from that lighter green to that darker green and they're now going, actually I want more. So that's that's been the sort of evolution of it a little bit, but I think for a lot of the new ones it is the if it's opening up as a a new um event in a new city it is the fact that no you probably have a a vacuum here of people wanting just an informal space to come and chat to each other and that is the value. That is the holding that space is the value which not everyone sort of gets initially I don't think and it takes a little bit of learning.

SPEAKER_01 44:35

What do you think the in terms of the future of People Planet Pint and once you have that initial wave attracting um or or filling that vacuum how do you how do you attract people that might not necessarily typically go along to an event like this? What do you think the challenge is in in overcoming that? This is the million dollar question.

SPEAKER_02 45:00

Possibly quite literally. This is what we're working on now. So we're just in the middle of wrapping up a big piece of work around user personas and going back to the drawing board of being like right who are we what's our mission why are we doing this why are we so let's try and codify or write down why we're saying we're not gonna make allow you to do workshops our events and why you why you can't do things is sort of as important as what you can do. And so I think that we're going through that and we've kind of identified about 14 different personas within this audience all of whom are welcome before I say what I'm about to say where we're like we're focusing on just two of them because that's where we think the impact is where it's like well there's still those other 12 of those 14 are still very welcome and that they still need to be there but we can't from a financial or marketing or like just effort point of view market to all 14 profiles because each of those has got different reasons to going in that as you say Jonathan like your reason for going versus the student's reasons for going versus the sustainability professional at a corporate they're all going to have very different motivations they're going to be hanging out at different places they're going to be seeing it in different locations and so from a pure marketing point of view us getting the message out there is incredibly difficult if we're doing it to all four team. And so we're focusing really on sustainability professionals and professionals who are curious about sustainability. So that's people who are working in this space who are typically going to be burned out they might be working in the organisation and they've probably had their team cut down in the past three years. So they've gone from having a team of three to one person and what we're seeing is quite often they're in an organisation of 1,000 2000 3000 people and their responsibility for that sustainability behaviour change and agenda for the entire organisation on their own which obviously is not uh okay or sustainable but they need somewhere to go to to meet a tribe like them to find that sort of network and realise that they're not alone and then the second audience really is those people who might be working on the you know tills at Tesco they might be a marketing executive in a small agency they might be a software engineer and they they're probably the only person in their sort of immediate colleague cohort who are uh that they they're aware of who are really keen in in in sustainability and that might be they really want like a a battery for the house and it's more of the techie side it might be they want to do more rewilding and bring biodiversity into their area maybe they're really interested in public transport and sort of active travel in the local city but they're seen as the green freaks in their in their team and therefore they can't be seen to be doing anything particularly um like agitated so they can't be seen to go to a protest and they probably don't feel comfortable doing that and nor should they that be their only option and it's like well actually come to the pub you will realize that you're you're no longer you're not the kind of the weirdo in your organization you've just been in the wrong room the entire time it's that there is a room of people here who really are passionate about that but you just maybe haven't seen those or been been exposed to them in your existing sort of immediate professional environment and that's where I think the impact that we can have is huge because already we've seen some people at the Glasgow meetup and it was really nice last last Thursday seeing several of those people come along going well I don't really know why I'm here but I just wanted to to hear more and it's like good because I know that within two years you'll have probably changed your career and chosen a job in sustainability and you'll never know that it's kind of sparked from this that you the that job probably will be found through this network but you won't be able to pin it back to that and there's a few examples of that of someone who's kind of come in and then they ended up running the Slipp0 program as a result of just popping in with a friend to see what this is all about. So I think that's where we're seeing the the real focus to go on of how do we scale that and break out of the break out of the bubble a little bit and that's where I get slightly jealous and frustrated looking at other um sort of networks and and other meetups that are doing really well on like Instagram and I think they've got great tone of voice and brand that we just need to try and refine down a little bit but it's one of those things that I think if we had more money we would be able to do a huge amount more impact than we can but it's it's trying to do that without being a wholly commercial thing.

SPEAKER_00 49:08

Yeah and I guess the the true the true output for you is you are having a meaningful impact even if you're not documenting it in all of those locations it is making a difference. You're making people feel safe or giving people the ability to have a common voice in those rooms and leave the pub feeling more confident or more empowered and which I think is yeah so important.

SPEAKER_02 49:35

So yeah well done on providing that that that that capacity for people well it I think it is just I wish we had more stories of it because I think it's it's great to I sort of you you know it works right and you have to trust the process and go like look just do this 12 months and it will it will have a really positive impact but how do you then capture that to to attract more people like them because sometimes we only hear from the people who are most passionate and that's not who the people who are feeling unconfident about coming want to hear from or look like you know the people want to look like a it's a room who look like them.

SPEAKER_00 50:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 50:10

So you need to be quite careful who you're sort of documenting is the or pedestalling in terms of those interviews and stuff on Instagram.

SPEAKER_01 50:15

Which is a whole like yeah I won't go into if this is a marketing strategy podcast but turn it into one of these it can be whenever we need it to be but it is uh you know it's a it's an interesting challenge it's fascinating and um I'm no doubt it you'll you you'll overcome the challenge and and um and find a way to market it appropriately and you know Tyler Crane proud sponsors People Planet Pine um because we believe in what you're doing and I've I've attended several there's one in my hotel hotel of Cheltenham and um I found it a really effective way of meeting individuals across totally different sectors, different walks of life who all have some shared values and interests but we're all at we're all different places in our sort of journey and in in knowledge and um of making changes in our own lives and it's just a a brilliant welcoming environment to go into have open conversations learn something meet some people in the local area and find out about local opportunities as well to get involved in community projects or just to um general networking you know it doesn't have to be purely focused on the sustainability aspect it's just finding others that you could work well with so it's it's brilliant you should go if you listen to this and you haven't been to one we will put a link up in the show notes of where to find your nearest event yes we've got loads coming we've got um South Africa is just coming online which is very exciting so we've got Johannesburg and Cape Town are just joining.

SPEAKER_02 51:46

So excited to see what conversations come up there.

SPEAKER_00 51:49

Do you know do you know how many you've been to yourself Adam sorry?

SPEAKER_02 51:53

Do you know how many you've been to yourself? In terms of how many disappointingly few I know people who've been to a lot more than I have um including someone who was at Australia and took a printout of them at the one in bath and I was like I I want to be the one that's going to Australia getting to hang out with people at the bath why don't I get to do that I'm just the the guy behind the scenes running all the bloody admin so no we are sort of thinking about one of the things I really want to do is some sort of tour where we actually go let's get like a a branded van or a branded ideally train carriage I think that'd be that would be amazing but probably a bit ambitious to then go around the country and just go to the events and and like interview people and be like what has this done to you what has this made meant for you and I I just try and capture some of those stories because there's so many happening all the time not only in terms of the physical events but the stories that are then happening as a result of that so we're trying to work on that and go actually how how would we get yeah more people on on board with that so if you're a brand out there who's thinking of uh joining the People Planet Pine tribe and helping us make that a reality please let me know.

SPEAKER_00 53:01

Yeah great show the other thing that you've done to I guess gamify sustainability which we've also embraced is the the action box card game which I think you probably launched maybe 18 months, two years ago something like that. It's about that 18 months so it was the carbon reduction fundamentals game which I first saw and we purchased for our offices and had you in for our team day but again what was your um what was the reasoning behind that? Again did you just see an opportunity actually to to to use play and interaction in a way where people could still learn at the same time about sustainability it's very funny timing because I have got 50 of the brand new second edition that arrived half an hour before I didn't record on this so um I'm posting those afterwards.

SPEAKER_02 53:48

Yeah it was very much it was what we learned from uh I'd say three years of training businesses. So in terms of small 99 we've always been about how do we get small businesses to start their decarbonisation journey and how do we empower them as we said earlier to to sort of realise that that better future is possible now and the commercial advantages of doing so. We were typically doing that through workshops and training so classic me at the front of a room with a clicker and a big PowerPoint presentation and hoping that people don't fall asleep at three o'clock after lunch which I think it's successfully avoided. And then we did like the we built a couple of digital tools so we had the small 99 hero platform as well as small 99 measure which were the same sort of idea of let's just try and get you going on this journey without you having to spend a huge amount of time on it it's it's all broken down into small actionable steps. But what we were realizing is that all of that wasn't really working like people would come and use those tools and be like yeah that was great five out of five or ten out of ten on the workshop stuff really loved it but then they would get to a point of going you never really had the behavior change off the back of it. People wouldn't go oh I've got my carbon footprint I've now changed these things as a result because who cares? Like they they've got a number they've been given something and I think that's where the gamification element came in. So we had a a test version beforehand called Crab which was the uh carbon reduction action box with mask included as a little kind of uh cheeky crab which is always good fun and the idea there was let's get people around a table let's do something completely offline and it was a really rough MVP and then we went okay this sort of works but it's a little bit rubbish and then we we kind of built the action box uh fundamentals as a result of that and moved away from the very sadly moved away from the crowd banding I was always quite quite keen on the opportunities there um probably for the best though for the longevity of it and so yeah we then went do you know what the power is getting people around the thing that was working with the workshops wasn't the slides it was the getting people around the table to discuss what they'd seen on the slides and how it made them feel that's when you started to see the behaviour change baking in and it's like well what if we just did an entire workshop where it's giving people those bits of paper to talk to each other because ultimately small business owners will trust other small business owners and therefore they can tell that story of what they've had in their experience and so that's where we're leaning more into that and I think the gamification part as well has been a great way to uh bust myths around this to go guess how we haven't got this card but we should have it was just like yeah guess how much solar is being produced in the UK or how much solar is uh generating electricity because if you tell someone people listening to this might have gone oh 30% that's quite a lot but if you get give the some someone two cards and go do you think we're generating more from coal, solar or wind turbines people are going to think about that and people are going to go well I think it's this and therefore they've got an emotional connection to it and therefore they've got a status attachment to the outcome of that and so as soon as they start revealing the answers no matter what it is 30 seconds ago they didn't care about what you were asking the question they've now got an emotional connection to it and the the they've got stakes in the outcome so when that answer is revealed they're going to have an emotional memory kind of response to that and they're gonna then take that on board and that will then start driving actions further down the line. And that happens the same if you're doing like a higher or lower game which is the start the icebreaker game at the start of the workshop where it's like you know what's the carbon emissions of a cup of tea versus an hour on zoom and other actions as well as then giving them actions of going well here's three actions on like water for example so do you um install a rainwater harvesting thing do you increase nature locally or do you install I can't remember what the third one is like you know paved uh like low flow taps I think it is at no point are you asking do they want to take action you're just saying well which one of these three do you want to do and then they immediately or most people will then go well I think this one's probably quite practical you go great well let's put that on your extra plan and commit to that then and it's that sort of momentum building and ownership giving that we found really work in in in transforming the way that teams then start actually feeling like they've got ownership and engagement in this and it's much more broken down. So we're trying to be the sort of anti-PDF anti-slides uh alternative and anti-tech of like you know you don't have to spend 10 grand on a license for your all of your staff you could just buy the kit and then start running it internally again and again and again in a way that is going to drive that behaviour change much more effectively which I think is yeah that's where we've seen we've already heard of people who've played that pub video game in the pub venues who have taken out their uh paper towels as a result and they're they've they're switched to a hand dryer because it's lower carbon and saves them costs but it's because they've thought of that themselves rather than being given the answer to it.

SPEAKER_01 58:41

Yeah I've I've definitely seen that with friends I've I've taken it to the pub actually and amongst friends that aren't that fast on the face of it but it turns into you know there's some there's some great interactions a bit of mickey taking between us and actually a few weeks later somebody will say they've changed something because they were a little bit shocked by one of the judgments that they'd made and assumed was correct and wasn't and and actually our team date I think the the fact you can see it works was the noise in the room of people interacting with each other and arguing over the impact of stuff and the great competitive nature of colleagues and and it's uh what I found fascinating from that is you've you know you've had a we had a room full of maybe 50 to 60 people um all gathered round you know we're we're an environmental consultancy we should we should be really good at this stuff right and actually we've got got so got so much wrong because it is that that individual sort of um opinion on you know an answer because you're not going to have all the answers to this stuff and I think that's kind of the point isn't it is it's the great it's a great sort of leveller of knowledge and expertise because it's such you know wide ranging topics is really it's really fascinating. But to see those changes take place in people's minds days, weeks later like John was referring to as well that's what I found powerful and and seeing the potential for this is it's far more engaging than than death by PowerPoint and uh you start to relate it to your own own life as well as and as well as what you do for work.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:18

I think that's it and I think it is almost the it's it's that gamification and using that as the the tool to try and get get into those conversations and bring it up and I think it is the the benefit I found is that those workshops I'm running is the the lack of facilitation is that people can discuss between themselves and it gives them a voice that typically they don't have in other forms of of training or learning. And that's not to say it's better or worse. I think it has its place around some of the other kind of things in the industry and it but it is that it's the only thing that I've seen that I truly believe actually is going to change behaviours. Because like most small businesses or most even like medium sized businesses they don't want more software to look at they want less software to look at they want less reports to do they want less questionnaires to answer they want less work to do they want to build operational resilience and the way to do that is by getting your team to play a game with each other to then understand how they can make a business better and make those decisions themselves whereas if they're just getting an external consultancy PDF impact doc document handed to them they've had no input or ownership over that conversation of how that's been produced and they're just being given something they don't really care about, even though they probably support it in like a very top level it's not going to change the actual behaviour. So I don't know where we're going with it necessarily a broader level but I do think it is that how do we change like how do we go from apathy to action is the big phrase that we're using at the minute of people who are apathetic but supportive into turning them into action and and that sort of behaviour change at a level and I don't think and when we say small businesses I do think that the sweet spot here is big small businesses who are you know a team of one two three four hundred people who have got a good culture internally but they don't have a huge amount of resources to to do it you know the the bigger more shiny in in interventions but they will if you get the people together they can actually start building those action plans and act quite quickly.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:21

It still has that sweet spot of they're small enough to be agile but they're big enough to have quite a considerable impact and and footprint and before we wrap up Adam I guess I'd just ask for your take on you know are you feeling optimistic about the future sustainability and you know if money was no object where would small 99 be in five years from now?

SPEAKER_02 1:02:47

Great question. I think if money was no object I think honestly the the things we've seen come from People Planet Point I would take that if you gave me a million pounds I'd be like right well we'll we'll take People Planet Point and we'll make that a household name within five years. That would be the sort of aim of it of to go there is a better future available there is better possibilities through local communities and the way we do that is through that brand of casual conversations reaching out to normal people providing that safe space. Action Box has a has a role in that I think I am feeling positive. I think it depends how you define sustainability so I think I would say that I'm okay it's a gout clause it depends uh but I I think I feel very positive about the changes that are going to happen through the energy market. I think the current government is doing a lot of good stuff that people don't realise and there will be a LinkedIn post soon on on as a summary of that but I think we're at a point where this summer we're going to see negative energy prices and therefore that's going to have a behaviour change shift at scale on load management and how people are using energy and thinking about that. And I think that's going to be really interesting to the impact it has. However that then still leaves out a lot of the conversation around nature biodiversity restoration land use and those bigger gnarly topics and I think we're still in a position where people don't think climate change is going to affect them in their lifetimes. They think it's going to affect them but not urgently and that's where I think we're looking into more of that how do we use the action box methodology and the small night methodology to drive behaviour change on climate resilience and climate adaptation more so than just decarbonisation because I think there's a much stronger narrative to say of like well you can make your local high street a more pleasant place to be that's going to be more resilient to climate change and it's going to be more commercially successful if you do all the all three of these things. Whereas if you're stuck on the carbon reduction language it gets a little bit loss orientated. So we're looking to launch more of those uh kits this year where it'll be slightly more I I I think more effectively reach normal people at scale I think so yeah I think positive I just think I think we're about to see a big systems change in the UK around energy markets and and what that looks like which I think will unlock stuff but I think that still avoids a lot of the conversation around the more difficult challenges of biodiversity and all that stuff.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:12

Brilliant thanks Adam thank you Adam so much and uh yeah for anyone listening um if you haven't been down to your local People Planet Pint thoroughly recommend you do that and as I said we'll share we'll share the link to where to find your local event and we will also Adam with your permission share your LinkedIn and yeah mirror what John said earlier. Your posts are very engaging thought provoking I think the debate that goes on the comments is um great entertainment uh so yeah thoroughly recommend engaging following Adam along and Adam what's the best way for people to get in touch with you if they're interested in either that action box or workshops?

SPEAKER_02 1:05:55

I'd say through LinkedIn is probably the the best way. I'm very active on there so always checking messages so yeah Just drop me a message on LinkedIn, connect with me, and yeah, take it from there.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:04

Brilliant. Uh look forward to seeing you, Adam, at a uh a future event of People Planet Pine. Absolutely. Thank you for joining.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:12

Thanks, Adam. See you in the pub sometime soon.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:15

Yeah, absolutely. See you in the pub. Thanks for listening. The gathering is produced by the Grave Collective and is edited by Lisa Curtis. A big thank you to Emma MP Co and Shenaz at Tyler Grange. We hope you enjoyed this episode. If you did, please subscribe and rate us wherever you get your podcasts. If you think someone might enjoy this, please do share it with them. We'll be back next month with another episode, so keep an eye on our socials for a sneak preview. And until next time, stay curious and keep growing up.