Last week, onefourzero published an article on growing demand and investment in the home automation sector. One area of home automation that consumers favoured were products that helped them save energy as well as money, such as smart meters. Today’s consumer is more environmentally conscious than ever before. Searches on Google for the term “eco-friendly” have more than doubled in the past 24 months. Therefore, it is important for companies to ensure they are coming up with ways to lessen their environmental impact. Furthermore, firms should consider who they are marketing their products towards. 80% of Tweets since August 27th 2016 mentioning the phrase “eco friendly products” were by users 35 and above. This contrasts to the general view that it is the millennial generation only who care about the environment. Other areas such as recycling also attract more and more attention. Indeed, perhaps more products that eco warrior millennials love need to make it onto the market. To crack this demographic could be a great investment.
The rise in green energy suppliers over recent years shows that many businesses in the energy sector however are succeeding in appealing to the eco conscious consumer. Yet there is still a lot of room in the sector for more other innovative new ideas. Therefore, an investment in some form of green energy tech is likely to be a smart one. onefourzero has used its digital data capabilities to analyse which green products are looking like the best investment opportunities.
One popular way to save energy is simply by monitoring your usage. Applications like Smappee and Sense make this easy. In fact, they make it so easy that overall 96% of tweets mentioning these accounts in 2018 have been positive or neutral about the companies. These apps provide insight into your energy use around the house through a smartphone application. They can even pinpoint which devices are using the most energy. The information is updated in real time, so you can quickly determine how to adjust your energy usage to both be greener and save money. However, there are also energy tech products out there that automatically do the energy saving for you. An example of this is products that use renewable energy sources such as solar power.
This summer, the UK officially experienced quite an extreme heatwave, accompanied by a lot more sunlight than Brits are used to. During this time, many people were choosing to spend as much time as possible outside, including late into the night when other light sources are needed. This is where solar powered garden lights come in. They charge up during the sunny days and release this energy as light after dusk, meaning you can enjoy the warm nights without contributing to global warming. Online mentions of such lights increased by 18% between 22nd May and 22nd July, the period just before and during the height of the heatwave. Furthermore, 0% of the online conversation was negative, proving these are a well-liked product by consumers. Similar low energy-consuming home products or gadgets could be a great investment opportunity.
The future is certainly green, and investment in such energy products is growing. With more and more investors making ESG influenced choices, surely a sector which focusses on being environmentally sustainable is an excellent place for them to look.
