Icon
How to Leverage Sustainability to Drive Revenue Growth

How to Leverage Sustainability to Drive Revenue Growth

Adrian Alfieri
Adrian Alfieri
CEO, Verbatim

Neutrl is a platform that makes it easy for consumers to shop sustainably. They're partnering with hundreds of brands like Enso Rings, Aura Bora, and Magic Mind to reduce the carbon footprint of consumer goods. 

We sat down with Ian Lazarus, Founder and CEO of Neutrl, to understand how his team enables DTC brands to operate more sustainably. Specifically, we cover:

  • Helping brands speak transparently about sustainability with their shoppers
  • What it means to build a community of like-minded shoppers
  • How to shift the narrative of being a modern brand that's aware of its carbon footprint


A Brand's Journey Towards Sustainability

Neutrl was born out of Ian's desire to help brands and consumers become more aware of the hidden cost of commerce and its impact on climate change.

He initially noticed that consumers were increasingly clamoring for brands to produce their products sustainably. In response, brands were trying to figure out how to address their relationship with climate change.

That's where Neutrl enters the picture. They built a tool that helps merchants calculate carbon emissions associated with customer orders.


You Have to Start Somewhere

When Ian pitches Neutrl to potential customers, they're often eager to plug the tool into their website immediately. However, Ian wants to ensure brands understand their climate footprint in addition to simply installing a shiny tool.

Brands can often spend months thinking about retooling their entire supply chain, but Ian reminds them that they can begin by offsetting the emissions from the thousands of packages they send out a day.

By waiting to reveal a brand's sustainability plans until they’re perfect, brands can miss out on a valuable opportunity to take action and share their sustainability journey with consumers immediately. 

"Consumers are more serious than ever about shopping sustainably. They want to combat climate change, but they just don't know where to start."


Building a Community Flywheel and Driving Value

Neutrl is focused on building a community of brands and shoppers aligned in their mission to be more carbon-conscious.

Making this their focus has allowed Neutrl to achieve incredible results for its partners, proving how serious both buyers and brands are about taking care of the environment. 

One of Neutrl's brand partners saw a 28% increase in revenue over a six-month window when consumers opted to offset their emissions with Neutrl at checkout, proving that sustainability is more than a fad.

While Neutrl's inclusion at checkout allows consumers to transact more sustainably, it also increases the chance they'll transact more often, driving greater LTV through customer retention.

"Increased revenue and conversions prove that buyers care about doing good."


More Than a Checkbox 

Neutrl is more than a checkbox. They are:

  • Addressing consumer desires to shop for products consciously
  • Empowering brands to speak about sustainability to their customers
  • Building long-term relationships with customers, leading to more revenue for the brands

"UPS won't help brands marketing their sustainable shipping efforts; that's our job."


Carbon Neutral; Shifting the Conversation

As carbon neutrality becomes more popular, Neutrl plays an active role in shifting the conversation for the general public.

The airline industry has normalized the option for customers to offset their emissions. 

Still, there isn't the same adoption when it comes to retail, even though apparel is one of the highest CO2-emitting industries in the world. By partnering with Neutrl, brands and consumers can actively take steps in the right direction.

"eCom continues to explode, meaning C02 emissions will only get worse. We have to change that." 


Being on the Right Side of History 

54% of Gen Z consumers think about their carbon footprint when shopping, and 88% of shoppers want brands to help them live more sustainably, but the reality is that many brands aren’t prepared to do so.

Neutrl solves this, seamlessly empowering brands to tell their sustainability story to consumers, building meaningful relationships as both combat climate change.

"We can't ignore climate change any longer. By partnering with us, you get to be on the right side of history."

Adrian Alfieri
Adrian Alfieri
CEO, Verbatim
5.0 rating
Trusted by 8228+ brands
Ridge
Mudwtr
Obvi
Backbone
Hiya
Jones Road
ridge ($100M+ revenue)
ridge ($100M+ revenue)
407K followers
Ridge
Mudwtr
Obvi
Backbone
Hiya
Jones Road
Problem

Coming up with 100 unique, 30-second scripts is painful.

Manually matching 3-second clips (from your 10,000-video library) for every shot of your 100 scripts is even more painful.

Creating 3 permutations of each of the 100 ads (for A/B testing) makes the pain even worse.

Now imagine voiceovers, captions, & uploading all 300 ads to Meta & TikTok on top of this. Also imagine you're an agency doing this for 10 brands (now we're at 3K ads).

Products for scriptwriting, video editing, creative storage, UGC, creative analytics, & competitor ad spying exist, but they're not built for making ads (or just built badly).

Capcut
Capcut
Video editing
$9.99/month
Adobe Premiere
Adobe Premiere
Video editing
$54.99/month
ChatGPT
ChatGPT
Scriptwriting
$20/month
Foreplay
Foreplay
Ad spying
$99/month
AdSpy
AdSpy
Ad spying
$149/month
Recharm
Recharm
Creative storage
$500-$3K/month
Motion
Motion
Creative analytics
$1K-$10K+/month
Billo
Billo
UGC
$99/video
Air
Air
Creative storage
$600-$5K+/month
+10 other tools
Solution

Icon solves this with the first AI Admaker. Think ChatGPT + CapCut, but for making winning ads with AI in minutes.

Icon starts by looking at your video library & tagging scenes (e.g. "sofa," "unboxing"). These scenes become reusable clips used as lego blocks for making ads.

From there, just enter ideas into AdGPT (ChatGPT for ads) to generate ads with perfectly matching clips for every scene.

AdGPT gets your ads 80-99% complete. Make edits with AdCut (CapCut for ads) or prompt AdGPT until you're happy.

3-person creative teams make 30 ads per month. With Icon, they make 300 (& get more winners).

We also replace $2K-$30K in monthly costs: scriptwriting (ChatGPT), video editing (CapCut, Premiere), creative storage (Frame.io, Air, Recharm), UGC (Arcads, MakeUGC, Billo), creative analytics (Motion), competitor ad spying (Foreplay), & more.

Solution

How it works

  • 1. Turn your videos into legos
    1. Turn your videos into legos
    Icon looks at your video library & tags scenes (e.g. "unboxing"). These scenes become reusable clips used as lego blocks for making ads.
  • 2. Create ads with AdGPT
    2. Create ads with AdGPT
    Use AdGPT to create ads that are 80-99% complete with perfectly matching clips for every scene.
  • 3. Edit ads with AdCut
    3. Edit ads with AdCut
    Use AdCut to edit your 80-99% complete AdGPT ads until you're happy.
  • 4. Replace Motion & Foreplay
    4. Replace Motion & Foreplay
    Save $2K-$30K/month with free creative analytics, free competitor ad spying, & more.
    You can also replace Frame.io, Air, & Recharm with our 0% markup creative storage, but feel free to do this later (we integrate with them).

AdGPT Workflows

  • Bring a script
    Bring a script
    Save time by finding matching videos for your script with Icon.
  • Bring a creative brief
    Bring a creative brief
    Save time by finding matching videos for your brief with Icon.
  • B-roll cutting
    B-roll cutting
    Save time by cutting in B-roll on your talking head videos with Icon.
  • Long form to ad
    Long form to ad
    Save time by turning reviews & interviews into ads with Icon.
  • Clone script from ad
    Clone script from ad
    Save time by cloning winning ad scripts from top brands with Icon.
  • Ad from voiceover
    Ad from voiceover
    Save time by creating an ad from a voiceover with Icon.

Products

What they're saying

Obvi
"We went from spending hours making each ad to building entire campaigns in minutes. Icon helps us shape perfect creatives at incredible speed."
Ron Shah

Ron Shah

CEO, Obvi
$100M+ revenue
Raycon
"Going from script to finished ads was overly complex. Icon streamlined the process from scriptwriting to ad creation with a few clicks."
Ray Lee

Ray Lee

CEO, Raycon
$100M+ revenue
222 Creative
"Our creative team was drowning in repetitive work. Icon transformed our workflow - now we can focus on strategy while they handle the rest."
Marco Staal

Marco Staal

CEO, 222 Creative
100+ clients with $10B+ revenue

Agency Directory

GR0

GR0

Monthly ads created
1000
Monthly adspend
$10M+
Avenue Z

Avenue Z

Monthly ads created
1000
Monthly adspend
$10M+

Story

Kennan Davison

Kennan Davison

CEO, Founder
Kennan Davison
Kennan Davison
Kennan Davison
Kennan Davison
Kennan Davison
Kennan Davison
Kennan Davison
Previously: Skio (CEO 2021-2024, $10M+ ARR in 3 years, profitable), Pinterest, Hulu, W+K (ad agency), Top 200 NA LoL, YC S20 (solo founder), Dropout.
Hi, I'm Kennan!
Growing up, I loved competitive gaming and eventually reached Top 200 North America in LoL (out of 100M+ players).
Read more of the story...
Founders Fund

Founders Fund

Icon Investor
Founders Fund
Founders Fund
Founders Fund
Founders Fund
Founders Fund
Founders Fund
Founders Fund
Peter Thiel's Founders Fund is a venture capital firm. Its partners have founded and funded companies including PayPal, Palantir, SpaceX, Anduril, Flexport, Airbnb and Stripe.
Kennan Davison

Kennan Davison

CEO, Founder
Kennan Davison
Kennan Davison
Kennan Davison
Kennan Davison
Kennan Davison
Kennan Davison
Kennan Davison
Previously: Skio (CEO 2021-2024, $10M+ ARR in 3 years, profitable), Pinterest, Hulu, W+K (ad agency), Top 200 NA LoL, YC S20 (solo founder), Dropout.

Explore more