A new browser extension, ‘The Beagle Button’, which presents consumers with planet-friendly, ethical products, and services as alternatives as they browse has released new data revealing which products are most popular with ethically-minded shoppers.
The top 20 performers are:
- Organic Cotton Jeans
- Organic, vegan bamboo G-strings
- Textile Off-Cut Reusable Face Masks
- Long-Lasting Solar Power Banks
- Organic Cotton High Waisted Skinny Jeans
- Fairtrade Organic Cotton Short Sleeve T-shirts
- Organic Denim Shirts
- Bamboo Toothbrushes
- Natural Roll-On Deodorant sticks
- Zero Waste Handmade Mascara
- Sustainably Sourced Rattan Laundry Bins
- Cruelty-Free Mineral Foundation
- Upcycled leggings
- Natural Handmade Soap Bars
- Reusable coffee capsules for Nespresso
- Plastic-free floss
- Zero waste cutlery sets
- Plastic-Free Conditioner ‘Kubes’
- Biodegradable Nappies
- Repurposed Wool Socks
Riding the wave of green-conscious, ethical consumerism, The Beagle Button is now forecast to divert a total of £10billion a year towards sustainable purchases by altering consumer behaviour at scale. Of the £10billion, £1.9billion is expected to come from diversions away from Amazon.
Since smashing its investment target in just 24hrs in October, the Beagle Button is now forecast to divert billions of consumer revenue towards sustainable products and businesses. The new tool (a browser extension akin to Grammarly and Honey) possesses an innovative blend of artificial intelligence and language recognition algorithms and is already delivering impressive click-through and conversion rates for consumers.
Open to the public for investment since October 1st on SEEDRS, the game-changing ‘Beagle Button’ presents consumers with planet-friendly, ethical products, and services as alternatives as they are browsing, in real-time.
Commenting on the new product popularity results and the goal to divert at least £1.9bn a year towards sustainable businesses, away from Amazon, CEO and co-founder of the Beagle Button, Daniel Hemsley, said: “It’s fascinating to see which products are proving to be the most popular green and ethical alternatives for shoppers using The Beagle Button. We are widening our options and reach every single day, so it’s great to see such a diverse range of products being chosen regularly by customers after they have been suggested by the button. It just goes to show that whatever you’re looking for, whether it be a sustainable laundry bin, cruelty-free makeup foundation, organic cotton jeans, or even an organic bamboo G-string, there is almost always a green option out there!
“The results of how consumers are using the button so far have surpassed even our highest hopes. The click throughs, the conversions, as well as the consumer and brand feedback has been fantastic. It just goes to show that the demand for sustainable shopping really is upon us. The potential positive impact is incredible – based on our modelling, the Beagle Button could divert at least 10 billion pounds a year by 2025, away from unsustainable purchases, towards verified green businesses and products. Of that 10 billion, almost a fifth should be from Amazon. That will be one of our key focuses given the huge amount of revenue that goes through their platform and the monumental impact those sales have on the planet.
“This is our number one goal. The climate crisis has to be tackled at scale, so we must adopt solutions that enable behaviour change at scale.
“We are delighted to see such enthusiasm for the product so early on. It took just one day for us to hit our target, and we’re open for investment for the rest of the month. The more we raise at this point, the more people we can reach and the faster and larger impact we can have. We know from all the climate data that time is of the essence, so that is driving our urgency to expand as quickly as possible.
“The Beagle Button offers a unique combination of consumer psychology and technical know-how which will impact consumer behaviour at scale. We believe changing consumer behaviour at scale is a crucial element to solving the climate crisis – this is a key driver for why we created the Beagle Button.
“The vast majority of consumers, around 73%, say they want to buy sustainably, but the percentage who actually do is much lower. Beagle’s mission is to close this aspiration – action gap. When we did our research into why people with good intentions don’t follow through, we identified the top two pain points…
“48% Don’t know how to easily find better products and 38% find it difficult to change their habits. The Beagle Button has been designed to solve both these pain points for consumers. It does all the research so that consumers don’t have to, popping up on a desktop screen in real time with a planet-friendly version of the very same product.”
The Beagle Button is purpose-built to overcome widespread consumer resistance to changing habits by being “inherently sticky”. Unlike apps and sustainability-focused websites, which require consumers to get into the habit of using them, once downloaded, the Beagle Button will jump into action at the right time with no need for the user to remember to activate it. This element to how the browser extension works is crucial to ensuring the success of change at scale.
Co-founder of Beagle Button, Tara Button, added: “It’s fascinating to see which products are performing well and capturing our users’ imagination. We are passionate about user privacy so we don’t track individuals, but our anonymised data gives a great insights into what the public want from their eco products and which products they are most willing to swap with eco alternatives. This information we hope will help the whole industry up its game.”
“Ultimately, most consumers care about the environment, but it’s hard for people to hold a long-term environmental crisis in mind while doing back-to-school shopping or while looking for essential items. With the Beagle Button, the consumer only has to care once, download a free shopping tool and from then on, we care for you and nudge you with friendly reminders towards the more ethical, sustainable choices.
“As you can see from the past couple of days, there is clearly a strong demand for this type of solution. It took a long time to develop as it had to pass rigorous testing, but it has been worth the wait!”
The Technology
Beagle’s proprietary technology identifies when a user is on a shopping page, then uses natural language processing and algorithms to find a match within Beagle’s database of approved products. If there is a match, it will pop within seconds for the shopper.
The Beagle Button chooses the products in its database according to criteria founded on its 5 pillars of sustainability.
1. Reduce emissions
2. Reduce waste
3. Reduce harmful chemicals
4. Protect workers
5. Protect Animals
Within the tool, users can select their preferences according to their values and what “Better” means to them. Depending on those preferences, they could be presented with: plastic free products, organic products, vegan and cruelty-free products, longer-lasting products, carbon-neutral products and products from minority owned companies, to name just a few examples.
Founding and Progress to Date
In 2019, Tara and Daniel met at Imperial University’s Plastic Hackathon. Working in the same group, they realised they were both trying to solve the same problem – the gap between people wanting to shop sustainably and then taking that action
Joined by Dave Henry, the co-founders developed the Beagle Button idea and raised £124k through Sustainable Ventures and a private angel investor.
With CTO Magnus Dahlstrand on board, the Beta was launched in 2020 to a test audience of 1,000 people, with results that even surprised the creators. 10% of users, when presented with a product, clicked on it. In comparison, 2-5% might click on a best practice Google or Facebook advert. Then, when the user lands in the ethical shop, the conversion rate is 3%, meaning they are almost twice as likely to make a purchase, than the average e-commerce visitor.
The Beagle Button is now live on Seedrs with a target of £250k, which has already been surpassed as over £360k has been committed.
This round will take the technology developed for the Beta version of the product and take it to a level where it is to be launched to the public on a large scale.
“We want it to feel like magic”, says Tara Button. “That’s when word of mouth will take off. People will be saying – Just Beagle it!”
Over the next 5 years, The Beagle Button aims to redirect billions of pounds away from potentially harmful purchases, towards the products and brands that have made the biggest strides towards mitigating their negative impacts. The team has decided to launch in the UK which has the most mature e-commerce market in the world, but in order to have the impact their mission demands, the US and other markets will soon follow.
The Team
According to one of their investors:
“The Beagle Team are set for success because they bring together deep knowledge of the consumer mindset, technological excellence, environmental passion, and ruthless efficiency.”
Daniel Hemsley – CEO
A management consultant turned entrepreneur, Daniel left the corporate world to lead the award-winning creative agency Swamp Motel. As Managing Director he established a global client roster including Verizon Media, Twitter, Capcom and Deloitte. In 2018, following his passion for sustainable living, he launched Unwrpd, a zero-waste subscription business before founding The Beagle Button in a bid to take conscious consumption mainstream. His experience ranges from early-stage pre-seed businesses to some of the biggest brands in the world
Dave Henry – COO
Dave Henry’s experience spans consulting, venture building, and leadership roles within social enterprises. After beginning his career in digital strategy, he moved into the world of sustainability, supporting the rollout of solar energy products to tens of thousands of households across the developing world. He’s never looked back and since then has lived & worked in 5 countries and for businesses varying in size from pre-seed start-ups through to FTSE100 corporations.
Tara Button – Creative Director
Tara did a degree in Social Anthropology, the study of human behaviour, which she used in her advertising career, crafting campaigns for the likes of Fiat, Nutella, and DFS. In 2016, her “sidehustle”, eco website, Buy Me Once, went viral with global newspaper and TV coverage and Ashton Kutcher and Caitlin Moran both proclaiming to be fans. Her book on consumer behaviour, A Life Less Throwaway was published in 2018. Buy Me Once has gone to launch two successful equity crowdfunds, raising 600k and 1.1M (last week) on Crowdcube.
Magnus Dahlstrand CTO
Magnus started his career as a programmer in the advertising industry building bespoke online experiences for global brands such as Nike, Wrangler, and Philips before building websites and APIs for a range of online publications. He has honed his skills over the last five years while working as a freelance programmer building tools and websites for end-clients such as eBay, the BBC, and WHO. His deep interest in sustainability has led him to continuously push to work with more sustainable brands, and The Beagle Button is his latest entry on this journey.
Methodology for Forecast Data
Beagle Button forecasts a value of at least £10bn per year can be diverted to verified sustainable businesses based on the expected number of recommendations per user, click through rates, conversion percentage and average basket size in 2025, based on a UK adult population of 55million and a UK online retail market worth £200billion (desktop share estimated at £100bn). Beagle Button’s goal is to influence purchases for at least 10% of this market. For Amazon, 10% of its 2020 revenue (excluding revenue from Amazon Prime TV) would amount to £1.9bn (source: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2021/feb/03/amazon-reports-uk-sales-rose-by-51-in-2020
