Brand Finance’s latest round of research appears to indicate a slight reduction in the role of sustainability in driving consumer choice. But sustainability remains a powerful driver of choice in markets around the world.
Of 48 industry sectors surveyed, 38 saw the influence of sustainability decline from 2024 to 2025.
2025 is proving to be a challenging year for brands when it comes to managing sustainability perceptions.
There is an increasingly dismissive (or even hostile) attitude to ESG from some parts of the political, investment, and business communities.
This may be driven by political ESG backlash, by cost-of-living concerns, or by a mix of other factors.
That said, it’s important not to overstate the year-on-year change.
Apple, the world’s most valuable brand, retains the highest sustainability perceptions value of any brand, at $39bn.
This may come as a surprise to some—Apple has been subject to regular criticism on issues such as labour conditions in its production facilities, links to conflict zones in the sourcing of key minerals, and greenhouse gas emissions at various scope levels.
It is important to reiterate that Apple’s position at the top of the table is not an assessment of its actual sustainability performance, nor does it imply that Apple is perceived to have an exceptional commitment to sustainability.
Rather, it reflects the fact that the preponderance of consumers around the world believe that Apple is making efforts to minimise its negative impacts.
They feel that Apple is committed to sustainability—or at least committed enough for them to continue using its products.
This, combined with the financial scale of Apple’s operations and brand, results in Apple’s top position.
Over a three-year cycle, the importance of sustainability actually rises in the majority of sectors.
Brand Finance research continues to indicate that sustainability plays a significantly stronger role in driving choice in the luxury and premium market segment.
The three sectors where sustainability plays the greatest role in determining choice are luxury auto, champagne, and spirits.
A 23% variation in choice in luxury auto is explained by sustainability, twice the share for the broader auto sector.
There is a similar pattern in cosmetics – sustainability is 50% more important as a demand driver in luxury cosmetics than in the wider cosmetics market.
Why such a strong role for sustainability at the premium end of markets?
A brand’s sustainability commitments may imply a slight cost increase that necessitates more premium positioning.
Premium-segment consumers also have less price sensitivity, enabling them to seek improvements on other attributes, including sustainability.
Lastly, at the premium end of many markets, brands become more than just a guarantee of attributes to the consumer—their products are also a signal of the purchaser’s status, taste, identity, and/or ethics.
Sustainability is often seen to be more salient in consumer decision-making; however, our research indicates an equally powerful role in a B2B context.
In addition to our global consumer brand equity research, Brand Finance conducts research with specialist B2B audiences, including buyers of IT services solutions.
This reveals that sustainability accounts for 15.8% of choice variation in IT services, up 1.7% from 2024.
IT services brands such as TCS, HCL, and Infosys have made sustainability a significant theme in their marketing for many years, backed by commitments to educate their staff and improve the efficiency of their operations.
The brands that are best perceived across the environmental, social and governance dimensions of sustainability are the brands that overtly make ESG part of their positioning.
In the food sector, common themes amongst brands with sustainability-led positioning include the health and environmental benefits of local ingredients and lower-carbon, plant-based alternatives.
Meal shake brand Huel has the strongest environmental sustainability perceptions in Food among US respondents, and smoothie brands Innocent and Naked drinks stood out in the US and UK research results as well.
All of these brands’ marketing links health to environmentally friendly living.
Supermarkets and food retailers with the strongest sustainability perceptions include Trader Joe’s, Whole Foods, Alnatura, Coop, and Biocoop.
These brands are likely recognised for showcasing a mix of organic, local, and sustainably produced offerings.
For example, Whole Foods runs an annual campaign for products made by women-owned businesses and B Corporations.
Supporting small businesses and local producers not only reduces environmental impact through shorter supply chains but also empowers consumers to align their purchases with their values, reinforcing both environmental and social sustainability.
For the second year in a row, The North Face and Patagonia net strong sustainability perceptions within apparel.
Both brands promote their lower impact and circular products, positioning themselves as environmentally sustainable, and the research indicates that this recognition extends across both the American and European research markets.
Patagonia is widely recognised across industries as a pioneer in corporate sustainability – an early campaigner, continued disruptor, and advocate for climate action and local employment.
Personal care brands continue to innovate their packaging, clean ingredients, inclusivity, and body positivity.
Dove, La Roche Posay, Yves Rocher, The Body Shop, and L’Occitane are all highly recognised for sustainability across the US, UK, Germany, India, China and France.
The Body Shop helped set early standards for sustainability through its advocacy against animal testing and environmental campaigning, principles that newer standouts are building on through innovations like low-waste packaging and clean, ethically sourced ingredients.
In the luxury research segment of the auto industry, electric vehicle manufacturers are perceived as strong on sustainability. Polestar, Mercedes and Alpine all have robust perceptions across several markets.
Even Tesla, despite its recent setbacks, continues to net high environmental perceptions in the US and China.
Performance and perception are frequently not aligned.
Indeed, across the full set of our research, there is not a statistically significant correlation between the two.
This means that brands that commit to sustainability cannot necessarily expect stakeholders to automatically acknowledge and reward them for their efforts.
Microsoft is a case in point.
Microsoft is demonstrating leadership on sustainability, especially relative to many of the world’s very biggest brands.
Yet, Microsoft could potentially generate even more value from communication about its sustainability initiatives.
Microsoft has the highest ‘Gap Value’ of any brand in the Sustainability Perceptions Index.
The Gap Value represents the difference between perceived sustainability and actual sustainability performance.
A positive value indicates that a brand’s sustainability performance is better than its perceptions would suggest.
In Microsoft’s case, this value exceeds $5.6bn.
This gap value has grown since last year, suggesting that rather than capturing value, Microsoft is taking an even more tentative approach to sustainability communication.
The changing political climate in the US, increasingly tight advertising regulation around greenwashing, and continued activist scrutiny can make it tempting for brands to mute discussion of sustainability.
Scaling back communication on sustainability in fear of stakeholder criticism—called greenhushing—has major drawbacks.
Brands that fail to convey their progress on sustainability are leaving money on the table, reducing value for shareholders.
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