The Ethos Lever Model: Sales, Explained
The Ethos Lever Model utilizes fourteen different “Levers” by which an organization can make an impact. Each Lever serves a real opportunity to create value - but when strategically pulled together, result in a powerful and cohesive Social Impact strategy.
In this blog series, the Ethos team breaks down each Lever - complete with expanded definitions and real-life examples - so you can best understand how to pull the right Levers through your organization's social impact work. See all 14 Levers here.
Lever: Sales
For some businesses, the good they bring into the world is already baked into the organization, through selling products or services that inherently support social impact objectives.
Maximize the Sales Lever:
- Ensure the data collected on the sales side is consistently integrated with data on the impact side.
- As always, create (and utilize) criteria to ensure Sales efforts are strategically leveraged - as a starting point, all activations should align with at least one other Lever.
Sales: Real-Life Examples
1.Beyond Meat: A Los Angeles–based producer of plant-based meat substitutes, Beyond Meat believes that by shifting from animal to plant-based meat, we can positively affect the planet, the environment, the climate and even ourselves. A peer-reviewed Life Cycle Analysis conducted by the University of Michigan compared the environmental impact of the original Beyond Burger to a ¼ lb. U.S. beef burger, and found that producing a Beyond Burger uses significantly less water, land and energy – and it generates 90% fewer Greenhouse Gas Emissions than a beef burger. Their products are excellent sources of protein and are generally healthier when compared to real meat (their Beyond Burger, for example, contains 35% less total and saturated fats than a beef burger). Plus, according to World Animal Protection, plant-based burgers are saving around 250,000 animals per year.
2.Playbook: A music software tool, Playbook believes that all students – no matter where they live – have a right to a world-class musical education. It’s a resource that allows students the ability to access private instruction through instrument specific mentors, built by a team that believes in teaching music the same way language is taught – instead of focusing on perfection and rote memorization, they encourage expression and communication. They view music as a lifelong vehicle that builds joy, community, and self-empowerment.
School band classes have students on many different instruments at vastly different skill levels, meaning students require one-on-one instruction – but most schools don’t have the resources to support that. Playbook allows educators to provide students individual attention. And at the same time, Playbook grants individual students at home the ability to play with a large band.
3.Opiant: Opiant is an LA-based specialty pharmaceutical company with a mission to create best-in-class medicines for the treatment of addictions and drug overdose. The company views addiction as a chronic brain disease that can be treated medically – not a “character flaw” – and works to share that evidence-based understanding with the greater community.
More than 20 million people in the United States live with a substance use disorder – but only 10% of those affected receive treatment for their condition. To address the diverse and mounting demands of modern-day substance use, Opiant is advancing a pipeline of scientifically-informed treatment approaches. In 2013, Opiant developed the first FDA-approved, user-friendly nasal naloxone spray: NARCAN® Nasal Spray, which is responsible for reversing countless fatal opioid overdoses. The company continues working to develop more products to save lives – including a stronger nasal spray to address the fentanyl crisis, nasal naltrexone for Alcohol Use Disorder, and a novel heroin vaccine.