Could Your Next Big Opportunity Come From Your Customers?
What if understanding your customers’ sustainability priorities could help you win more business?
Across the world, large companies are working to reduce environmental impacts, improve working conditions, use resources more efficiently and strengthen their supply chains.
But they cannot achieve all this on their own.
They depend on thousands of suppliers, service providers and business partners, each contributing to their wider sustainability performance.
For businesses that recognise this, an interesting opportunity emerges.
Instead of viewing sustainability as another requirement imposed by customers, what if you approached it as an opportunity to become a more valuable business partner?
Your Customer’s Challenges Could Become Your Opportunities
Imagine you operate a logistics company delivering thousands of parcels for an international retailer.
Your customer has made commitments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions across its operations and value chain.
You could regard this as an additional burden. Perhaps the customer will eventually request emissions data, introduce new procurement criteria or ask about your environmental performance.
Alternatively, you could take the initiative.
You might explore more efficient delivery routes, introduce lower emission vehicles where commercially viable, improve vehicle utilisation or develop systems to measure and communicate your environmental performance.
These improvements could lower operating costs while also helping your customer achieve its objectives.
Now consider the commercial possibilities.
When your customer reviews its logistics arrangements, which supplier might be better positioned to demonstrate additional value?
One that simply delivers parcels, or one that delivers parcels competitively while also helping the customer achieve its sustainability objectives?
The difference is not just environmental performance. It is the ability to understand what matters to your customer and respond with solutions.
Sustainability Can Create Value Across Different Industries
The opportunity is not limited to logistics.
Consider these illustrative examples:
| Business | Sustainability opportunity | Potential commercial benefit |
| Food producer | Reduce water consumption, food waste and packaging | Lower costs and stronger appeal to retail customers |
| Manufacturer | Improve material efficiency and increase recycled content | Resource savings and product differentiation |
| Construction supplier | Provide products with verified environmental information | Better positioning for projects with sustainability criteria |
| Agricultural business | Improve soil management, water efficiency and traceability | Stronger relationships with buyers seeking responsible sourcing |
| Technology provider | Develop energy efficient systems and equipment | Help customers reduce energy consumption and operating costs |
| Service provider | Improve workforce wellbeing, skills and retention | More reliable service and greater customer confidence |
These are not guaranteed results. The commercial benefits will depend on the business, the investment required and customer priorities.
Nevertheless, they demonstrate an important principle.
Sustainability becomes commercially relevant when it helps businesses solve real problems, improve performance and deliver something customers value.
Large Companies Are Looking Beyond Their Own Operations
Why does this create opportunities for suppliers?
Because a company’s sustainability impacts, dependencies, risks and opportunities frequently extend beyond its premises.
A retailer may operate energy efficient buildings but still depend on the environmental performance of manufacturers, logistics providers and packaging suppliers.
A construction company may improve its own operations while much of the environmental impact associated with its projects arises from materials purchased.
A food manufacturer may reduce waste within its factories but remain dependent on agricultural practices, water availability and the treatment of workers throughout its supply chain.
The Global Reporting Initiative’s GRI 3: Material Topics 2021 recognises the importance of identifying impacts connected with an organisation’s activities and business relationships, including those throughout its value chain (GRI, 2021).
Similarly, IFRS S1 recognises that sustainability related risks and opportunities can arise from a company’s dependencies, impacts and relationships throughout its value chain (IFRS Foundation, 2023).
These frameworks approach materiality from different perspectives, but both reinforce the importance of looking beyond an organisation’s immediate operations.
This creates a potentially valuable position for suppliers.
A business that understands its own sustainability performance can help its customers better understand and improve theirs.
Indeed, CDP’s 2026 analysis of sustainable supply chains highlights how businesses are incorporating environmental information into procurement and supplier engagement to support more resilient and sustainable operations (CDP, 2026).
From Being a Supplier to Becoming a Preferred Business Partner
Price, quality, reliability and delivery will always matter.
Sustainability does not replace these fundamentals.
However, where customers are working towards specific environmental or social objectives, a supplier that understands and supports those objectives may offer additional value.
Consider two manufacturers producing comparable components at competitive prices.
Both meet the customer’s technical specifications and delivery requirements.
One provides the components.
The other can additionally demonstrate responsible sourcing, lower material waste, credible environmental data and opportunities to improve resource efficiency.
The second manufacturer may offer the customer something beyond the product itself.
It offers information, insight and opportunities for improvement.
Over time, these capabilities could strengthen the commercial relationship, encourage collaboration and support longer term agreements.
The objective should not simply be to become a supplier that meets sustainability requirements.
It should be to become a supplier whose capabilities help customers succeed.
How Can Your Business Identify These Opportunities?
The starting point does not need to be expensive or complicated.
Consider five practical steps.
- Understand your customers’ priorities
Visit the sustainability sections of your customers’ websites. Read their sustainability reports and identify their main commitments.
Are they concentrating on energy, emissions, water, waste, responsible sourcing, employee wellbeing or other significant impacts?
- Examine your contribution to their value chain
Consider where your products, services and business activities influence these priorities.
For example, could you help reduce packaging, improve energy efficiency, enhance traceability or support more responsible working practices?
- Identify opportunities that also benefit your business
Look for improvements that can increase efficiency, reduce costs, strengthen quality or create new revenue opportunities.
The strongest opportunities may be those where customer needs and your commercial interests overlap.
- Gather credible information
Measure what matters. Establish a baseline, identify areas for improvement and maintain evidence supporting your claims.
Credible information is more valuable than broad statements about being environmentally friendly or socially responsible.
- Start a conversation
Rather than waiting for your customer to send another sustainability questionnaire, ask a different question:
“We have been looking at your sustainability priorities. Could we work together on improvements that benefit both our businesses?”
That conversation could reveal opportunities that would otherwise remain undiscovered.
The Role of Sustainability Reporting
This is where sustainability reporting can provide considerably more value than simply producing a document.
The process of preparing a meaningful sustainability report encourages businesses to examine their activities, relationships and impacts systematically.
Applying the GRI Standards helps organisations identify and report on their most significant impacts on the economy, environment and people, including impacts on human rights.
When this understanding is complemented by an assessment of sustainability related financial risks and opportunities, management gains a broader perspective.
It can begin connecting three important questions:
- What significant impacts does our business have on people, the environment and the economy?
- How might our sustainability related risks, dependencies and opportunities affect our own business?
- Where can improvements create value for our customers and other stakeholders?
This broader understanding can help businesses identify opportunities that might otherwise remain hidden within routine operations.
The report then becomes more than a communication exercise.
It becomes an outcome of a process that helps management understand the business, make better decisions and identify opportunities for improvement.
A Different Way to Think About Business Resilience
Resilience is often associated with preparing for disruption, maintaining business continuity and recovering from unexpected events.
These are important capabilities.
But resilience can also have a positive dimension.
Businesses can become more resilient by developing new capabilities, strengthening relationships, improving efficiency and finding additional sources of value.
A supplier that helps customers meet their evolving needs may be better positioned to maintain strong relationships and explore new markets.
A manufacturer that uses materials more efficiently may improve both environmental performance and profitability.
A business that understands its wider value chain may recognise opportunities for collaboration and innovation.
In each case, sustainability can contribute to stronger commercial foundations.
The Opportunity May Already Be in Front of You
Your next business opportunity may not require entering a new country, developing an entirely new product or finding a new customer.
It may begin with understanding an existing customer’s needs more deeply.
What are their sustainability priorities?
What challenges are they trying to overcome?
And how could your business help them succeed?
The most valuable question may not be what your customers expect from you today, but what you could help them achieve tomorrow.
That is where sustainability, business opportunity and resilience come together.
Turn Sustainability Knowledge into Business Value
FBRH Consultants’ GRI Certified Training Programmes equip professionals with the knowledge and practical tools to prepare a first class sustainability report using the GRI Standards.
Our approach incorporates enhanced materiality assessment, examining significant sustainability impacts alongside relevant risks, opportunities and value chain relationships.
Participants develop a practical, step by step Plan of Action that can support better sustainability reporting and more informed business decisions.
Explore FBRH’s GRI Certified Training Programmes
Simon Pitsillides
Simon Pitsillides is a board adviser specialising in sustainability governance, corporate reporting, strategy and stakeholder value creation. He supports boards and senior executives in strengthening governance, enhancing decision-making and integrating sustainability into long-term business strategy.
Simon is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Marketing (FCIM), a Fellow of the Institute of Sustainability and Environmental Professionals (FISEP), a Chartered Marketer, and holds an MBA in Marketing. He is also a GRI and ISEP Certified Trainer.
As Founder of FBRH Consultants and publisher of SustainCase, Simon combines strategic, commercial and governance expertise with extensive international experience in sustainability reporting, assurance readiness and value creation. He has worked with multinational organisations, financial institutions and public sector bodies across Europe, the Middle East and beyond.
Simon is recognised for helping boards move beyond compliance by using decision-useful sustainability information to strengthen strategy, manage risk, build stakeholder confidence and create long-term value for business, stakeholders and the planet.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/simon-pitsillides
References
CDP (2026) Sustainable Supply Chains: How Disclosure Data Drives Progress and Accelerates Action. 18 March. Available at: https://www.cdp.net/en/insights/sustainable-supply-chains (Accessed: 13 October 2026).
Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) (2021) GRI 3: Material Topics 2021. Amsterdam: Global Reporting Initiative. Available at: https://www.globalreporting.org/publications/documents/english/gri-3-material-topics-2021/ (Accessed: 13 October 2026).
IFRS Foundation (2023) IFRS S1 General Requirements for Disclosure of Sustainability-related Financial Information. London: IFRS Foundation. Available at: https://www.ifrs.org/issued-standards/ifrs-sustainability-standards-navigator/ifrs-s1-general-requirements.html/ (Accessed: 13 October 2026).
IFRS Foundation (2024) Sustainability-related risks and opportunities and the disclosure of material information. London: IFRS Foundation. Available at: https://www.ifrs.org/news-and-events/news/2024/11/ifrs-foundation-publishes-guide-companies-sustainability-risks-opportunities/ (Accessed: 13 October 2026).