Renewal Process: Impact Score
Impact is at the heart of our business. The Renewal Workshop tracks and reports our Impact Data comprehensively and transparently which allows us to provide insights never before available on products lifetime value and impact. During Step 6 of the Renewal process, each product is scored so that you, the customer, can see the positive environmental impact of buying renewed.
When we created The Renewal Workshop, we knew we needed to demonstrate how we turn the unspoken waste problem into an opportunity, we had to develop metrics to fully understand the impact of unsellable inventory. This is how our Impact Score came to life.
The score has four parts to it:
ENVIRONMENT
We measure the Environmental Impact of the original product. We use Life-cycle Assessment (LCA) data to determine the energy, greenhouse gas, water, and toxin consumption used in making the product the first time.
WASTE REDUCTION
We use the actual weight of the product to determine how much has been diverted from landfill.
PRICE
We want to see more money in a circular economy, not a linear one. We count the money invested in the circular economy using the purchase price for each item.
JOBS
We track the number of Living Wage jobs created as a result of our work. We use the number of current full-time employees at The Renewal Workshop to count our contribution to creating re-manufacturing jobs in the US.
All four numbers are weighted equally. The formula takes the various savings of the environmental impacts and buckets them into a grade for each product. Values representing these grades are added to the weight, the price and the jobs count. Voila – that’s the number you see for every product we sell.
We are often asked if a high score is better than a low score. The honest answer is no. Extending the life of every single product we sell makes an immediate positive difference. By choosing a product with a high environmental impact like conventional cotton, which uses a lot of water and toxics, you are preventing those resources from having to be used. Another item might be more expensive or weigh more, so it is contributing in a different way to reduce landfill and expand the circular economy.
There are no wrong choices here. You’re doing better for people and the planet by buying Renewed. Period. We hope that seeing our Impact Score in each item provides you with that simple reminder.
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