A climate-friendly reward card    

The card provides cashback for shoppers who buy low-carbon alternatives to everyday items

Spotted: Many payment card reward programmes incentivise high-carbon activities such as flying and filling up cars with petrol. As a result, they can actively encourage consumers to make less sustainable choices.  

Looking to flip this dynamic on its head is startup Future, which has released the FutureCard – a Visa debit card that rewards shoppers when they choose to purchase sustainable alternatives to everyday items.  

Cardholders receive 6 per cent cashback when they purchase products from the company’s partners, called FuturePartners. These include sustainable brands such as Back Market and Everlasting Wardrobe. The card also offers 5 per cent cashback on purchases that peer-reviewed research has confirmed have a lower carbon footprint than common alternatives. Such sustainable purchases include public transport, electric vehicle charging, bikes and scooters, recycled clothes, restored electronics, and plant-based meat, dairy, and eggs.  

The card has no fees and does not require a credit check, just a linked bank account. And unlike other ’green’ debit card reward programmes that claim to offset emissions from day-to-day transactions, Future doesn’t use customer’s points to invest in carbon offsets and initiatives such as tree planting. Instead, FutureCard attempts to influence consumer’s basic habits by using cashback to incentivise more sustainable choices.  

Springwise has previously spotted several other fintech solutions that are focused on promoting sustainable consumer decisions. These include a credit card made of wood that lets you plant trees as you spend, an API making it easy for banks and payment providers to offer carbon footprint tracking, and a startup that has created a loyalty programme for the planet.

Written By: Matthew Hempstead