80% say sustainability matters to them. Only 5% consistently buy sustainable. The difference is not motivation. It is context. SUE helps you make the sustainable choice the easy choice.
They design sustainable behaviour with SUE
500+ organisations • 15 years of Behavioural Design • 14 courses for every level
More awareness. More campaigns. More labels. Yet behaviour does not change. Most sustainability approaches fail for one reason: they count on motivation that is not there at the moment of choice.
Everyone knows plastic is bad for the environment. Yet we reach for the plastic bag. Knowledge and awareness are necessary but not sufficient. Between knowing and doing lies a gap no campaign can close.
80% aware, 5% buy sustainableConsumers say one thing and do another. Not out of hypocrisy, but out of being human. At the moment of choice, convenience beats conviction. The sustainable option is too expensive, too far away, or too complicated.
Intention ≠ action (Sheeran & Webb)After years of climate targets, CO2 labels and apocalyptic imagery, desensitisation sets in. People shut down. Communicating more urgency makes the problem worse. The brain protects itself against overload.
Desensitisation after repeated exposureMandates and bans backfire when they restrict freedom of choice. Reactance: the more you force, the more resistance you get. Effective sustainability policy works with, not against, human nature.
Reactance: bans strengthen defiance (Brehm)Want to learn more about how nudging works? Read the full article →
Sustainability communication focuses on the why: why the climate is changing, why you should fly less, why organic is better. But the why only reaches System 2. And System 2 does not decide.
The breakthrough is not in better arguments, but in better design. Make the sustainable choice the default. Bring the sustainable option closer. Make visible that the majority is already choosing sustainably.
SUE designs the choice context so that sustainable behaviour becomes the path of least resistance. No preaching, no guilt. Just smart design.
"You cannot not-design. Every supermarket layout, every energy bill, every canteen choice steers behaviour. The question is not whether you influence sustainable behaviour, but whether you do it consciously."
— Tom de Bruyne, Gamechangers
Designing sustainable behaviour does not have to be complex. Three behavioural principles account for the largest share of impact. Together they form the toolkit for effective sustainability design.
Make the sustainable option the pre-selected choice. Green energy as the default with energy suppliers. Double-sided printing as default. Reusable bag as the norm. 80% of people choose the default.
Bring the sustainable option literally and figuratively closer. Fruit at eye level in the canteen. The stairs more visible than the lift. The reusable cup next to the coffee machine.
Make visible what the majority does. "73% of your neighbours are already saving energy." Do not threaten with what is going wrong, but show what is going right. Social proof is the strongest driver.
Loss aversion is twice as strong as gain motivation. "You are wasting €340 per year on energy leaks" is more effective than "You could save €340." Frame the cost of non-sustainable behaviour, not the gain of sustainable behaviour.
Designing sustainable behaviour is not marketing. It is built on decades of behavioural research.
Johnson and Goldstein demonstrated: the default determines the behaviour of the vast majority. In countries where organ donation is the default, 90%+ donate automatically. The same logic applies to sustainable choices.
Losing €100 hurts psychologically twice as much as gaining €100. That is why "you are wasting" is more effective than "you could save." Framing is not a trick — it is how the brain works.
Opower demonstrated: when households see how much their neighbours save, their own energy consumption drops by 2-4%. No subsidy, no fine — just visibility of the social norm.
Replace your sustainability campaign with a default intervention: make the sustainable option the standard in your choice environment. Test it in one category. Measure the difference after 30 days.
Whether you want to learn the behavioural principles yourself, train your team, or need an organisation-wide sustainability approach: there is a path that fits. Every level builds on the same foundation: behavioural science instead of good intentions.
The science behind sustainable behaviour
A full-day intensive training in the principles of behavioural economics applied to sustainability. You learn how defaults, framing and social norms work — and how to deploy them.
For: Sustainability managers, policy makers, communication professionals
The complete method in two days
"We thought we needed to create awareness. After the Fundamentals training we understood we needed to design the choice environment. The result: -28% plastic in our canteen in three months."
Sustainability Manager, Dutch retailerThe two-day Fundamentals Course is the foundation. You learn the complete Behavioural Design method: from behavioural analysis to intervention design. Applied to your own sustainability challenge.
For: Teams and individuals who want to learn the complete method
A multi-month tailored programme
A multi-month programme where SUE analyses the sustainability challenge and redesigns the choice context. From behavioural diagnosis and default audit to implementation and embedding.
For: Organisations that want to structurally embed sustainable behaviour
How small adjustments to the choice environment produce large behaviour change.
Sludge is the opposite of nudging: unnecessary friction that blocks desired behaviour.
The ethical foundation of nudging: how to steer behaviour without restricting freedom of choice.
Because awareness engages System 2 — the slow, analytical brain. But 96% of our daily behaviour runs on System 1: automatic, on autopilot. People know they should live more sustainably, but at the moment of choice, convenience beats conviction. The intention-action gap is the core problem of sustainability communication.
The intention-action gap is the difference between what people say they want to do and what they actually do. 80% of consumers say sustainability matters to them. Only 5% consistently buy sustainable. The difference is not motivation but context: the sustainable option is often more expensive, harder to find, or less attractively presented.
We use three proven behavioural principles: (1) Defaults: make the sustainable option the standard, (2) Proximity: bring the sustainable choice closer in the choice environment, (3) Social norms: make visible that the majority is already choosing sustainably. No preaching, no guilt — just smart design.
Nudging is not manipulation. It is the deliberate design of choice environments. Every choice environment steers behaviour — including the current one. The question is not whether you influence behaviour, but whether you do it consciously and transparently. SUE always works from the principle of libertarian paternalism: preserve freedom of choice, but make the sustainable choice easier.
We work with organisations that want to encourage sustainable behaviour: from energy companies and government bodies to retailers, insurers and food companies. Whether it concerns energy saving, waste separation, sustainable procurement or mobility behaviour — the behavioural principles are universal.
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