Browser extension ranks retailers based on sustainability metrics

Fairify

Fairify collects data and conducts extensive research to rank brands for “fairness” in five categories

Spotted: Most of us want to shop only from the most sustainable brands. But it can be very complicated to know just how sustainable a brand is, especially given the huge amount of misinformation and greenwashing sloshing around. The startup Fairify is working to take the guesswork out of sustainable shopping with its new browser extension.

For every company it covers, Fairify collects data and conducts extensive research to rank brands for “fairness” in five categories: Ambition, Transparency, Planet, People and Animals. For example, in the Ambition category, Fairify examines information regarding whether the company is meeting climate targets; whether they have established sustainability working groups; are actively improving materials; and what philanthropic causes they support.

Once the data is collected, Fairify gives the brand one of five grades, from Leader (awarded to brands with a high score on every element and which are built from the ground up with sustainability and fairness in mind) to Terrible (the brand provides little to no information about how they operate). Once users download the browser extension, the Fairify rating will pop up automatically as users shop online.

The extension will also provide more sustainable alternatives to low-ranked brands, allowing users to more easily chose fairer options for themselves. As the company told Springwise, the idea came about because: “We wanted to buy more sustainable ourselves, but found that existing options were either unreliable or very time-consuming. After doing some research, we found that 85 per cent of consumers face the same problem. There is currently a huge amount of impact not being made, that’s why we decided to solve this problem.”

This is not the first app we have seen at Springwise that aims to make it easier for users to shop, and live, more sustainably. Recently, we have covered innovations such as an app that tracks individuals’ plastic use and an app that manages home food use to minimise waste.