Plant Trees for Free Alongside Customers
8 minute read
The Ecodrive Shopify App allows brands to offer carbon neutral shipping through tree planting
Planting trees absorbs CO2, alleviates poverty, promotes biodiversity, and protects coastlines
Brands can leverage tree planting in their marketing campaigns to drive sales and conversions while capturing eco-conscious consumers
Consumers care more about sustainability now than ever before. Some brands have already taken steps to be more sustainable and others might still be figuring it out. No matter where a brand is in their journey, Ecodrive’s Shopify App can enable brands to be more sustainable by encouraging customers to plant trees at check-out. And the best part for your brand? It’s free.
How it Works
Our app seamlessly integrates to any Shopify store, creating a toggle feature that is automatically displayed at checkout. Positioned just above the checkout button, this feature gives customers the opportunity to opt in to planting a tree with their order.
At the end of each month, your brand will be charged through Shopify for the number of orders that had an Ecodrive product in the cart. This cost is already covered by the small fee your customers paid at checkout when they opted in, so there’s no extra cost to the brand.
The Ecodrive Dashboard provides monthly totals and important statistics, such as your brand’s lifetime Ecodrive conversion rate. It will also display the lifetime total pounds of CO2 removed from your customer’s tree plantings. This figure can be used to build community with your customers by emphasizing that, without their help, the removal of these emissions would not be possible.
What Happens Next
Once the order is placed, we take care of the rest. We hire local villagers in our planting areas in Madagascar to plant mangrove trees. Mangroves absorb more carbon dioxide than almost any other tree in the world. A whopping 680 pounds of carbon dioxide can be absorbed by just one mangrove in its lifetime! That’s more than enough to offset a standard e-commerce shipment.
Not only can you feel good about reducing your brand’s carbon footprint, but you’re also working with your customers to alleviate poverty. We hire local workers in villages with little economic opportunity to plant and maintain our trees. Their wages support each individual worker and their family and stimulate the local economy.
The benefits of giving your customers the chance to plant trees with Ecodrive don’t stop there. Our trees provide shelter and food to a variety of species, slow coastal erosion, and protect coastal communities from the dangers of storm surges. When you integrate Ecodrive into your online store, you enable your customers to fight climate change, support impoverished communities, restore habitats for animals, and protect coastlines, with just one click.
Who’s Already Using It
All kinds of brands use the Ecodrive App. Some are clothing retailers, others sell food or drinks, and others create new ways for beer to stay cold. But what they have in common is a recognition that sustainability is both important for the good of the earth, and has the added benefit of increasing conversions and gaining customers. Below are a few examples of brands that use the Ecodrive App.
Lotus and Luna creates beautiful jewelry, apparel, and accessories by employing talented artisans living in villages outside of Chaing Mai in Northern Thailand. The brand’s mission is to provide fair and consistent employment for local female artisans to end the cycle of poverty. This commitment to social responsibility naturally extends to care for the planet, which motivated Lotus and Luna to use the Ecodrive App.
Muddy Paws Coffee is committed to treating all beings within their process with the respect they deserve. That’s why they source all of their coffee beans from organic, fair-trade, bird-friendly farms. They are working toward reducing their carbon emissions throughout their supply chain to make the world a healthier and cleaner place.
Your brand doesn’t need to already have a huge sustainability focus to use and benefit from the Ecodrive App. KANGA Coolers creates iceless coolers that are lightweight and more convenient than traditional coolers. They wanted to do something good for the planet, while still providing their customers with the highest quality product, and the Ecodrive App was the perfect solution.
It doesn’t matter what product your brand sells, adding Ecodrive’s toggle feature to your store makes customers happy because they know they’re buying from a brand that cares about the planet. Brands can leverage their tree planting option in their marketing materials, driving sales, increasing conversions, and capturing sustainable shoppers. You get to help the planet and grow your business at the same time, all for free.
