As the climate crisis ramps up, so has the creativity of social entrepreneurs all around the world. Every year, more and more entrepreneurs are finding new ways to use their skills to communicate that enough is enough.
The path before us is challenging to say the least, but social entrepreneurship and how we tell our stories are powerful vehicles for change.
Meet the women showcasing how their creative agencies are transforming today’s most pressing environmental issues through branding, messaging, publishing, and design.
Women-Led Creative Agencies Improving the Planet
Go To Market, Led by Amanda Hofman
Go To Market is a woman-owned company looking to change the way the world handles swag.
How my agency improves the planet:
Swag and branded merchandise is an incredibly wasteful industry. Companies buy large quantities of branded items to meet minimums and often throw their logo on everything they print.
This degrades the value of those items to the people who receive it. We create custom print-on-demand digital shops that have no inventory and no minimums.
Each item is printed as it is ordered, which means that there is no waste from changing your branding, unused sizes, or just having merch that no one wants.
We have built nearly 100 shops for our clients.
Every single client of ours was tired of the wastefulness of printing in bulk and looked to us to make their giving more sustainable and thoughtful!
The clients we aim to work with in 2024:
Mid-size companies that print large quantities of merchandise so that we can switch them over to more sustainable practices.
Not only is it better for the environment, but swag recipients are much happier when they can choose the swag they receive.
Chykalophia, Led by Ari Krzyzek
Chykalophia is helping women-led brands in B2B tech and DTC FemTech transform their websites into platforms that drive business growth.
How my agency improves the planet:
Our commitment to enhancing the planet’s well-being shines through in our project with the City of Evanston.
Tasked with creating an interactive and immersive graphic display for the city’s “Experience Climate Change” campaign, we embraced the challenge to educate and inspire action among the community.
Our deliverables included an engaging graphic design centered on water conservation and climate education, as well as interactive elements designed to prompt residents to consider and visualize the impact of their actions.
Through this project, Chykalophia has proven that creative design can be a powerful catalyst for environmental education and community resilience.
The clients we aim to work with in 2024:
FemTech innovators who are revolutionizing women’s health, from menopause and infertility solutions to maternity care.
My personal woman’s health journey has been deeply influenced by the strides in this sector, and I’m passionate about empowering more female founders in FemTech.
By transforming their visionary concepts into tangible prototypes and scaling their ventures through cutting-edge web technologies, we aim to amplify their impact on women’s lives globally.
Montie & Joie, Led by Sydney Sherman De Arenas
Montie & Joie is an ethical home goods and clothing brand that focuses on financially empowering women around the world.
How my agency improves the planet:
Our artisans exclusively use sustainable materials, including deadstock, thrifted, and second-hand textiles that would otherwise end up in landfill. For us, it’s impossible to separate people and the planet.
That’s why our artisans are all paid fair wages and have excellent working conditions, allowing them to provide for their families and follow their creative ambitions.
Sustainability is a responsibility that we embrace with joy, and we extend that joy to our environmentally conscious clients and customers.
In the world of interior design, this kind of commitment to sustainability is hard to come by. We’re excited to play our part in looking after the planet through increasingly creative projects.
The clients we aim to work with in 2024:
We’re excited to be working as the interior and exterior designer for The Astrid, a luxury ski-in ski-out condominium in Steamboat Springs, Colorado.
We’re delighted to showcase to The Astrid’s residents how refined mountain luxury can be expressed with unique and ethically made products and furniture.
We’re actively interested in working with other interior designers to help them source ethical furniture, materials, and services, coming together to make the world a fairer and more beautiful place for everyone.
Miel Creative, Led by Rebekah Miel
Miel Creative is an agency amplifying the impact of triple bottom line businesses, nonprofits, and other purpose-driven organizations.
How my agency improves the planet:
All of the work we do focuses on what we call climate possibility. We work with clients who are solving complex problems like soil health, carbon capture, food systems change, and biodiversity.
Our goal is to make beautiful sense out of these complex ideas and build sustainable systems for founders and changemakers to clearly illustrate the good work they are doing.
Sometimes this looks like a communications strategy, and sometimes it looks like a technical report. The bottom line is to always make solutions more helpful and hopeful.
The clients we aim to work with in 2024:
Those who are improving food systems, investing in regenerative agriculture, supporting biodiversity, and other natural solutions to climate change.
We’d also like to become more connected to organizations that prioritize environmental justice.
Misfit Media, Led by Kelsey Lindell
Misfit Media is a creative and consulting agency that helps brave brands create bold, inclusive campaigns.
How my agency improves the planet:
Disabled people are facing a human and civil rights crisis that nobody is paying attention to.
We are seven times more likely to experience violence or sexual assault; it is legal to pay us less minimum wage—as low as $3h an hour—in many states in the US; and we are four times more likely to die from climate change and natural disasters.
These problems are systemic, and the best way to get people to think about changing these systems is to change the way they view disability.
Knowing how much of our thought processes are determined by what we see in media, marketing, and entertainment, Misfit Media is on a mission to support and empower decision makers in these areas to understand the power they yield and help them use that influence to create systemic changes for our community.
I always say, “Those who create content create culture—if this weren’t true, none of us would have jobs.”
The clients we aim to work with in 2024:
Those who want to go beyond tokenism. We have our busiest month of the year every July for Disability Pride month and when others do one-off inclusion initiatives.
These are a great place to start but do not equitably represent disabled people. Disabled people exist year round, and we want to work with teams that recognize this.
We also want to work with teams that want to set serious goals for their representation initiatives. If 15% of the world has a disability, then 15% of your talent should reflect that.
Scout Lab, Led by Willow Hill
Scout Lab works with brands to expand and grow their presence and customer base in ways that support their core communities. I often see brands miss the mark when they focus on messages that are only about helping the planet.
The reality is that you must serve both people and the planet for work to be successful.
We recently launched a circular design campaign for CASETiFY that features artists making incredible art from their upcycled products. Doing good work that improves the planet must be interesting, innovative, and put people at the center.
The clients we aim to work with in 2024:
We’re looking forward to continuing our work in hospitality and healthcare. These categories have a huge impact on how we interact with the world around us at large and give way to healthier people and a healthier planet.
Here For Good Films, Led by Katie Hawkins
Here For Good Films is a socially conscious video production company helping purpose-driven businesses elevate their brand through story driven photo and video.
How my agency improves the planet:
When it comes to video production, we do things differently. We offer our clients high production value while keeping our footprint small and efficient.
This is especially important when our work takes us deep into the backcountry. Whether we find ourselves in the wilderness, in a studio, or anywhere in between, we always follow our golden rule: leave it better than you found it.
The clients we aim to work with in 2024: More outdoor brands who prioritize sustainability and plan for long term impact—both on people and the planet.
Better Together, Led by Catharine Montgomery
Better Together is galvanizing positive change for purpose-driven organizations through creative strategies, messaging, and branding.
How my agency improves the planet:
Better Together is dedicated to amplifying the voices of those who are often unheard and championing initiatives that drive social and environmental progress.
Through strategic communication and media outreach, we help organizations navigate and influence public discourse around pivotal issues.
The clients we aim to work with in 2024:
Better Together’s vision is to build a more just, environmentally sustainable world centered around human and labor rights, access to education, and healthcare for all through collaborative and creative communication campaigns.
We look forward to working with organizations like Fair Fight Action, the National Coalition for Sexual Health, and We Act to develop communications that bring awareness to their mission and support the communities they serve.
Little Sundays Studio, Led by Theresa Lennahan
Little Sundays Studio is helping independent, purpose-led brands grow through thoughtful, top-tier branding, packaging, and design.
How my agency improves the planet:
Working with everyday brands that make sustainability inclusive. For sustainable brands to truly do good, they need to be accessible to everyone, not an unobtainable luxury good.
We partner to build brands that anyone can afford to have in their home. We design for brands that have sustainability at their core and are available at your local store.
The work we do at Little Sundays makes picking an earth-friendly choice as easy as putting a beautifully designed package in your cart.
We know all those little eco-friendly wins on the shelf add up to a big impact on the planet.
The clients we aim to work with in 2024:
At Little Sundays Studio, our sweet spot is strategic branding and design for CPG brands, especially products in the food, beauty, and kids/family space.
We’re looking forward to working with more direct-to-consumer brands and helping them find nationwide distribution in Walmart, Target, Wegmans, and more.
A couple of our favorite clients from last year were vegan—like MindBlown and Erleia—and we’d love to do more in that space.
Quimby Digital, Led by Ashley Rector
Quimby Digital is an all-women team specializing in crafting bespoke social media and paid advertising strategies to elevate startups worldwide.
How my agency improves the planet:
Our women-led team works heavily with climate industry specific organizations to help spread their message on social media. These brands specifically are changing power, technology, and grid systems as we know it.
From green hydrogen to solar, we get to actively spend hours a day on outreach efforts letting consumers know they exist.
The clients we aim to work with in 2024: We look forward to working closely with climate tech brands in 2024.
All individuals featured in this article are members of Dreamers & Doers, an award-winning community that amplifies extraordinary women entrepreneurs, investors, and leaders by securing PR, forging authentic connections, and curating high-impact resources.
