A state of being comfortable, healthy, or happy. As well as being the definition of ‘wellbeing’ they’re also attributes many brands are now striving to achieve.

According to the recent World Resources Institute (WRI) report current food habits will lead to the destruction of all forests and catastrophic climate change by 2050. With more and more reports generating headlines like this, people’s mindsets are changing…. and rapidly!!!

The spectrum of ‘health’ has become far more rounded, with mental health now (but only just) being rightly acceptance into the fact that it takes more than being skinny to be happy (see recent weight watchers rebrand).

It seems that there has also been a sudden cultural awakening into the obvious – we’re killing this planet we call home. In walks ‘sustainability’ to save the day to lead the war against plastic and all things single use. I guess it just needed a ‘brand’ to generate awareness and buy-in to proactively start changing things for the better.

All this really does summarise perfectly into one word… ‘wellbeing’.

When we talk about ‘wellbeing’ it encompasses all of the above and probably a few things I’ve forgotten. To strive for wellbeing is to strive for complete health, for us, our pets and our planet.

So great, society is starting to look beyond the now and take our future wellbeing seriously, but how is this going to affect business?

What does wellbeing mean for business?

As cultural aspirations, requirements and fears dramatically evolve and revolve around improving our health and the world around us, ‘wellbeing’ is now a regular feature in the corporate landscape.

Corporations are attempting to jump on the wave of this cultural shift, but many are struggling to do so. Maybe they lack or have something that hinders them. Either way, they are very aware they are going to have to evolve to survive. Some like PepsiCo are simply hungrily buying up brands that have the ‘wellbeing’ personality and reputation so many desire.

This change in consumer mindsets maybe getting larger organisation’s hastily adjusting their moral compass, but what it has also done is open up a huge opportunity for smaller, independent brands who are uniquely positioned to authentically put consumer ‘wellbeing’ at their core.

So what makes an effective wellbeing brand?

Our work over the last few years has seen us analyse and define the wellbeing landscape and qualify what a brand needs to do to be successful within it. Handily, we will be sharing these insights in the first issue of The Body Language of Brands. A new series of insight publications where each issue delves into the world of a specific sector/category.