Helping Consumers Make Green Choices

Keith Zakheim 0:02

Welcome to the Age of Adoption podcast. I am your host, Keith Zakheim. Today, as we do with every podcast, we're going to ask our guest one question and one question only. What is your Age of Climate adoption story? A little bit about the age of adoption. We live in an era where enterprises of every shape and size, regardless of industry, must rapidly transform to become more sustainable, climate sensitive. And just my day job is CEO of the

Keith Zakheim 0:32

marketing public relations firm Antenna Group. Our agency works exclusively with conscious brands. What is a conscious brand? It is a brand that is conscious of its responsibility to be on the right side of history. Like most businesses, our clients are experiencing a transition from an age of innovation, an era in which technologists, entrepreneurs and investors focused on innovating climate and sustainable solutions, to this age of adoption which characterizes the world today.

Keith Zakheim 1:02

So if you accept the Age of Adoption hypothesis, then there's really only one salient question to be asked. What is your Age of Adoption story? Phil Radford stepped into the role of President and CEO of Consumer Reports just five months ago. But his track record of driving transformational change speaks volumes about what's to come. During his tenure as CEO of Greenpeace,

Keith Zakheim 1:32

Phil increased the organization's revenue by 233% while working with nearly 100 major corporations to improve their environmental practices. Now he's bringing that same strategic prowess to Consumer Reports, a nonprofit powerhouse that reaches millions of Americans seeking unbiased product reviews and buying advice. Today on the Age of Adoption podcast, Phil shares his vision for empowering consumers to make informed, sustainable

Keith Zakheim 2:02

choices in an era of climate urgency. Back with Phil in a sec. Hey, Phil. Welcome to the Age of Adoption podcast.

Phil Radford 2:12

Thanks, Keith. Great to be here.

Keith Zakheim 2:14

Yeah. And Phil, we're, I guess, having this conversation during Washington D.C. climate Week. Tons of events going on in the District of Columbia and we just actually finished a great event this morning. Great attendance. Seems to be a lot of buzz in the city around climate and sustainability, which is great, especially in light of some of the. Some of the political headwinds that seem to be emanating from the city when it comes to climate and sustainability. Fantastic to be with you and both of us also being in Washington D.C. today. So

Keith Zakheim 2:44

we're putting on our federal government hats, maybe, or certainly our Washington D.C. hats. And we will dive into what we always dive into on the Age of Adoption podcast. Phil, your professional background is intriguing mainly because now being the President and CEO of Consumer Reports, which, by the way, I never knew was a nonprofit, so I've always encountered it just As a publication, and an interesting one. But being president and CEO now of Consumer Reports, which always, of course, incorporated data and insights

Keith Zakheim 3:14

around climate, but never, at least from my perspective, seem to be central. Central to it. But your career background is deep, deep in climate sustainability and environment. And I would assume you coming and taking over the publication would seem to indicate increasing focus on climate and sustainability. But without leading you too much into that answer, I'm going to ask you if you don't mind sharing your career journey both before you got to Consumer Reports, what led you to Consumer Reports, and also

Keith Zakheim 3:43

curious as to why the match makes sense.

Phil Radford 3:47

Sounds great. You know, I started working on energy, actually, as a high school student. So growing up was around Earth Day 1990. Everybody was very focused on ozone depletion, global warming, and there were, you know, some of the dirtiest forms of electricity production were all around us. But in particular, waste incinerators were being built close to my home in the west side of Chicago. And those emit, you know, the most toxic chemicals known to science, dioxin. And also, we're in

Phil Radford 4:17

a neighborhood where 1 in 21 males, black males my age, would die by the age of 21 from gang violence from all sorts of causes. And being 11 blocks outside of the west side of Chicago, I just thought, wow, that's just another reason that people will become sick, could die. And it just.

Keith Zakheim 4:37

That's true. And that's true all over the country. I mean, environmental justice, specifically, focusing on neighborhoods that are socioeconomically challenged and have a lot of these types of challenges and different types of things cited there, and water quality, and those types of things typically impact those communities profoundly. So, yeah, totally.

Phil Radford 4:58

Right. And that was just about the time that environmental justice was becoming an issue on the radar. So I just got involved as a volunteer and would go to community hearings, would go to events, and played a very small part. Of course, just a high school volunteer at the time. But when community groups called and said that we'd won, I just got the itch for continuing to make change, Right? It made a real impact in people's lives. We didn't need to burn batteries and plastics to produce electricity, and there was a better way.

Phil Radford 5:28

So that set me on a path towards really caring about how we produce energy, how we protect people's health. I worked for consumer groups like Public Interest Research group like Public Citizen, where we both worked to protect.

Keith Zakheim 5:41

What'd you study in school?

Phil Radford 5:42

Political science and business. I took quite a bit of science and then realized there are plenty of people that could tell Me the chemical equations for why we have problems. And I needed skills.

Keith Zakheim 5:53

I'm not one of those people who could tell you, but.

Phil Radford 5:55

Right, but there are plenty. Right. So studied that in school and then just dove in. I worked for different consumer groups. I worked on energy and climate. So early on, ran campaigns in the caucuses and primaries that resulted in Senator McCain sponsoring the first Senate bill on climate, worked on different campaigns to rally mayors and scientists and economists to say that we needed to take action and really work to just start creating the issue. It became pretty clear that

Phil Radford 6:25

the big issue was that there weren't alternatives to the causes of global warming. And so I shifted and focused on two big barriers for solar. One was manufacturing capacity and economies of scale, and one was finance. And so back in 2001, I started a group called PowerShift that worked with Citigroup and others to offer clean energy and energy efficient mortgages to make it more affordable for consumers. We worked with about a dozen cities and counties to issue solar

Phil Radford 6:54

bonds to start to scale up demand for solar. This was when there were 200 megawatts of solar manufactured globally a year. Right. And every time you doubled it, it would drop in price 20 to 30%. And so the whole purpose was drive down the cost and solve the finance barriers. I went on to run Greenpeace, where we worked with. I just met with staff from Google recently, and I think they generously said, you know, in Google, we credit Greenpeace with why we have shifted to 100% clean energy. We worked with Google, Facebook, Apple,

Phil Radford 7:24

a whole range of companies, in part because there were states like North Carolina that didn't want to give consumers choice to have clean energy. And it took convincing the biggest buyers to demand that from utilities and regulators to even open up the markets. And so a lot of the work that I did at Greenpeace was to work with the biggest buyers, get them to demand clean energy, change rules at the Public Utility Commission level, so that these markets that we have today and take for granted today would actually be open.

Keith Zakheim 7:51

Greenpeace is global, though, right?

Phil Radford 7:53

That's right.

Keith Zakheim 7:54

Did you focus more on kind of domestic issues?

Phil Radford 7:56

I worked on. I ran Greenpeace US and we worked on global issues. And in part because a lot of the US Companies have huge leverage over the government of Indonesia or the government of Brazil. And so we were able to open markets for clean energy, for alternative products, for, you know, for products that destroy forests by working with big US Companies to create that demand and then demand new policy.

Keith Zakheim 8:22

Yeah. And to be fair, I Guess when it comes to climate, there's no such thing as global or domestic.

Phil Radford 8:25

Right.

Keith Zakheim 8:26

I mean.

Phil Radford 8:26

Right.

Keith Zakheim 8:27

You can't keep this in the four walls of any country. So.

Phil Radford 8:29

Yeah, right. That's for sure. The pollution or the market forces. That's right. So, you know, from Greenpeace, I went on to do a range of different work. And what really drew me to Consumer Reports was that, first, I'd worked in the consumer world before with PRIG and Public Citizen. Second is that for that consumers fundamentally care about being healthy, money in our pockets being safe, products that last and that are good. And we really need to get back to talking to people about the

Phil Radford 8:59

basics of what they want in a product and what they want in their lives. And what we find here is that people care more about how long the product lasts, that they have a right to repair, that they'll save money by buying it, that there is an ecosystem of charging infrastructure to make their use of the product easier. Right. I think so much of the age of adoption will be about consumers having great products and a great ecosystem that supports those products so that the choice is clear. And Consumer

Phil Radford 9:29

Reports does really incredible work in that area.

Keith Zakheim 9:33

Yeah, I think it's interesting. I'm listening to a podcast right now about Ikea. I think it's. What is it? What's the podcast acquired? It's become a popular podcast. Anyway, they're talking about the founder of Ikea and his two things when it came to products was it needs to be designed well and high quality, but not at the expense of it making sense for consumers. So it's got to be affordable and it's got to have real utility. And of course, IKEA became Ikea because of that. So it kind of, to me, it echoes

Keith Zakheim 10:03

kind of what you're talking about right now when it comes to this industry. So you did steal the term age of adoption before I asked you the question. A little bit of a teaser. But I'm going to give you the question that strikes fear in the hearts of some. But for others, it's an opportunity to tell their story. So, Phil, what is your age of adoption story?

Phil Radford 10:28

You know, it's interesting when I think about all the different companies that come on the podcast, much of it is how they are adopting transformative tech, much of it is how they're changing their products. And for Consumer Reports, our product is fundamentally rating, testing products, reviewing products, and recommending products to people. Right. And that can be incredibly transformative. So our age of adoption story is, for example, we just received an award from vast company for innovation, for

Phil Radford 10:57

our work, to work with consumers to evaluate the ecosystem of charging of infrastructure to support EV buyers. We developed new ways of testing electric vehicles to make sure that they're reliable, the batteries last as long as they say. We're also testing smaller batteries in, you know, in like scooters where they are catching on fire quite a bit. And. But we've been able to develop new ways of testing things and new ways of looking at the market ecosystem so that these are things that consumers want

Phil Radford 11:27

and when they own them, they enjoy them, they last a long time and they don't regret the purchase. And so part of our age of adoption story is working to create the environment where these products are adopted and working to rate the products and make sure that they're high quality. We just received a message from a board member of a major electric vehicle manufacturer who said, I love what you do. I know we're not rated that highly. You are the jet fuel in our engine. You keep us

Phil Radford 11:57

focused on getting better and creating a better consumer product.

Keith Zakheim 12:00

Hopefully that jet fuel is sustainable aviation.

Phil Radford 12:03

I believe it is. I believe it is. I'm pretty sure. But yeah, so we are the sustainable aviation fuel. I'm not sure why an electric car company is using jet fuel, but that's for a different time. But just the fact that we push them to design a product and have a product that's safe that customers like is incredibly important. And it's to the point now where several car companies are working with us on their prototypes, where we evaluate and test their prototypes to make sure that when it hits the market in five years, consumers will actually use it, love

Phil Radford 12:33

it, and it will be exactly what they're looking for, at least for the US market. So there are a lot of different stories like that of Consumer Reports work to influence the market and products in the age of innovation and adoption.

Keith Zakheim 12:47

Yeah, no. It strikes me as particularly interesting that to a certain degree we live in a post truth age and an environment and a culture which doesn't particularly look at facts in the same way maybe it did, doesn't believe in data, doesn't believe in science. That's not true of everybody, of course, but there's seemingly a significant amount of people that that take that position. And Consumer Reports, which

Keith Zakheim 13:16

ultimately I would assume fails or succeeds based on its credibility to bring to the marketplace objective data around quality. It's interesting that that still works. And think about is that what's that model? Why does it work and how could that be replicated by other industries? Other news organizations, anyway, just amusing, but I'm curious if you think about that at all and what that might mean.

Phil Radford 13:44

We think about that all the time. I think our currency is trust. And so we think about that a lot. I think there are a few things. I think one is we use rigorous testing, right? We test products. We are very objective. We have very strict rules about our firewalls around to avoid any influence. We don't take advertising dollars from any of the companies where we rate. So most news organizations have subscribers and advertisers. That influences editorial. We don't have

Phil Radford 14:14

Advertisers. We are 100% powered by our 5 million subscribers and members. So that keeps us independent and it keeps us loyal to our consumers. I think the other piece is that, you know, while I personally drive an electric vehicle, we aren't out there saying, well, because Phil likes electric vehicles. That is what we're advocating for. We really ask consumers, how will they use a vehicle for. For example, is it. You know, and what will they save based on their usage and what are they looking for when we recommend different vehicles to

Phil Radford 14:44

them? And so we. We have to stay true to what consumers want. And the impact we can make in the marketplace is, you know, if. If I'm Ford or GM or another company and I'm struggling with selling electric vehicles, and I want to know why and what consumers aren't finding attractive about them. We can give advice on what consumers find attractive so that they can make better products, but our loyalty is always to the consumer first. I think it is an interesting time where you look at social media and you don't know what, you know what's produced by AI, but you don't know everything that's

Phil Radford 15:14

produced by AI it's hard to know what's true anymore. So it really is about brands that are built on trust, where you know that they have your interests at heart and that is their core mission. And that's Consumer Reports. Yeah.

Keith Zakheim 15:28

And especially also, I mean, you can have a YouTube channel or an Insta account with a million followers, and all of a sudden you're your own media company. I just heard a story about. There was a press conference at the White House yesterday, the day before, where one of the journalists who was there saw somebody in the front row just kind of setting up a camera and dancing. And so afterwards, he was curious. He asked her, he said, what's this all about? And she said that she has a

Keith Zakheim 15:58

TikTok channel that has I don't know how many millions of followers. And her thing is to go to press conferences and dance. And she recently got a million dollar sponsorship from some company, some brand because I guess that made sense for them. So serious journalism and serious journalism that ultimately is predicated on facts and data and real research and insights to me is at a premium now and very much needed in this environment. I asked you one more question related

Keith Zakheim 16:28

to all this. In age of adoption. So there's definitely political headwinds and not sure if there's cultural headwinds. I don't know if culture is kind of what pushes politics or vice versa. But either way, Gen Z. So for Gen Z, climate change, according to really every survey and polls, is a top concern. And that's going to impact how they buy and what they buy and their trust and confidence in brands. Do you think that

Keith Zakheim 16:58

this moment in time is going to have an impact on that and start to water that down? And potentially if it's a top concern now because it kind of sows doubt, does that become less of a concern? Curious your thoughts on that?

Phil Radford 17:13

Yeah, I'm not sure. But from our consumer surveys and our interviews that we do, we run the largest consumer survey in the US every year. What we generally find is that people care about saving money. They care about their health, they care about pocketbook issues, they care about safety, many people care about security, cybersecurity. That a lot of the things people care about the most are just the things that really deeply affect their lives day to day. And I think to the extent it's kind of like with solar sales,

Phil Radford 17:43

there's a small set of people that buy solar because they care about the environment or climate change. But the first buyers were really Republicans with swimming pools in San Diego that had a giant electricity load. Right. And so I think fundamentally it is incumbent on really what's a dominant energy industry now, the clean energy industry and storage energy industry, to offer solutions that really meet people where they are and saving money, having a more

Phil Radford 18:13

comfortable home, more comfortable life, safety, health, all those things. And I think being having environmental attributes will win over some customers or be a plus. But I think the biggest market of people is people that we can all relate to. They want money in their pockets. We want to be healthy and we want to live a safe, secure life.

Keith Zakheim 18:33

Yeah. And I guess we come full circle with that. And I agree. And one of the things that we are counseling our clients right now is that when you look at climate and sustainability, there's multiple value propositions. And you know, maybe a couple years ago the virtue value proposition was a powerful one to articulate. Now it's less so it needs to be deprioritized. What needs to be prioritized, as you said, is the economics of it. Resiliency, energy, abundance, health, all these different types of things

Keith Zakheim 19:02

that do impact people's day to day lives. Which are true. Right? It's not disingenuous, it's not semantics. It's true. And in this environment that needs to be prioritized as a message over potentially the virtue message. Anyway, Phil, thank you so much. Yeah, Keith, thank you for joining me on the Age of Adoption podcast. It was a pleasure to have you on. I know that you have a lot of content out there, so if people want to follow you, continue to engage with you through content, I guess Consumer Reports and that website's

Keith Zakheim 19:32

a great way. Do you post content on LinkedIn other channels?

Phil Radford 19:36

We do, we do. But consumerreports.org is a great place to start.

Keith Zakheim 19:39

Yep, yep. Fantastic, Phil, thanks again.

Phil Radford 19:42

Thank you, Keith. Have a great day.

Keith Zakheim 19:44

The Age of adoption podcast features CEOs, investors, entrepreneurs and policymakers sharing their climate and sustainability business transformation stories. Episodes can be found on your favorite podcast apps including itunes and Spotify. The Age of Adoption Podcast this podcast is brought to you by Antenna Group. Antenna is the home of conscious brands. We partner with companies that don't wait for change to happen. These brands shape the future, are awake

Keith Zakheim 20:14

and already moving, unsure if you are a conscious brand or even if you are one, whether you are positioned as one, Please visit our website at www.antennagroup.com and take the Conscious Compass Assessment, a groundbreaking tool that enables enterprises to assess their brand against the eight traits of brand consciousness. At Antenna, we partner with companies big and small, from growth Stage to Fortune 100, to tell their

Keith Zakheim 20:44

climate and sustainability stories. So once again, if you're interested in joining the conscious brand movement and learning more about Antenna Group, please check out our website at www.antennagroup.com. ping us on LinkedIn and make sure to visit the Conscious Compass.

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