We Are Sustainable, And We Like Partnering With 'Like-Minded' Orgs

I have been thinking a lot about 'sustainability' since Stellantis announced the opening of its Circular Economy Hub in Turin, Italy in November. The hub will support a sustainable business model for parts and vehicles, vehicle reconditioning, and vehicle dismantling, with the scope set to expand globally. Way to go, Stellantis. We are proud to be associated with you.

R2 Media is a sustainable organization and we have been a sustainable organization for years. While people -- corporate types -- tend to think about profits, people and planet when thinking about sustainability, we at R2 Media think about planet, people and profits. Always planet first, then people and then profits. Fact is, if we couldn't do what we do without adversely affecting the planet, and without trading fairly with our people (and people in our process chain), we wouldn't do it.

Most people think of R2 Media as an advertising agency. While it was founded as an advertising agency in 2010, it evolved over the years, into a technology company. Today, I consider R2 Media to be an 'ad tech' company.

The reason I make this distinction, and the reason this is important to this discussion, is because I am a technology optomist, and I believe that technology will make us more sustainable.

I believe, at my core, that every problem has a technical solution, and if you give your tech team and your product team the resources they need, they will find an innovation fix to every problem. The people at Stellantis obviously feel the same way I do. [For the technology pessimists reading this... I, of course, acknowledge that many of the planet's problems are a direct result of technology.]

Having said that, you do have to do technology the right way.

When R2 Media's innovation teams attack a problem, they do it with the understanding that new technologies have consequences, including consequences that are unknown and unexpected. The challenge of anticipating consequences is of paramount importance to us at R2 Media. When thinking through technology consequences we always focus on things like complexity, dynamics, intrasparence, and mistaken hypothesis.

The other two things we always do is (1) look at problems completely, with boundaries big enough to include all aspects of the sustainable framework and (2) look at problems from both a spatial and temporal perspective. We always try to understand what is happening in our world from a sustainability standpoint today, and how any changes we make will affect us tomorrow.

The great 'sustainability' debate in the automobile sector today is, did the introduction of hybrid cars — clearly a technological advancement — make things better for planet and people or did the introduction of hybrids actually make things worse? It's a fair question... did the appeal of hybrids mean more cars were sold, which put more cars on the road, which meant more miles were being driven, and more accidents were being realized. More accidents obviously means more deaths.

Not to mention, the significant sustainability issues connected with the mining of materials for batteries to power hybrids and then the issues related to the disposal of all the batteries that were used to power hybrid cars. (Obviously, the next great debate will evolve around EVs and whether they actually make things better for planet and people or not.)

On the advertising front, technology has brought us streaming capabilities (Connected TV and Streaming Audio) that have revolutionized the media business. They enable marketers to put the right ad, in front of the right person, at the right time (when he or she is open to buy).

As a result, programmatic ad buying has become a central part of media campaigns for all advertisers: national, regional, local and hyper local. Programmatic ad buying has made our advertising more effective and efficient. Programmatic ad buying has made marketers more sustainable.

R2 Media is committed to offering the best product and service to its partners, and to doing so in a way that always helps planet and people.