This post was sponsored by , all opinions and editorial my own.

Conscious consumer choices, on their own, are not enough to change the world. They’re a brilliant thing to do if you can but, in isolation, they’re not the best way to make change happen.

True change needs to happen from the bottom up and the top down. Restructuring world systems, new policies, and working collectively are vital to building a sustainable future. But collective action can be hard to find for many reasons: accessibility, time, money or a myriad of other concerns can often leave us with no capacity to join collective moments in the ways we would like.

All we may have is our consumer choice. So what do we do then?

Enter the new app , which both helps provide better alternatives for your everyday choices and enables you to transform those choices into collective statements that help businesses do better.

A free app to download, mission is threefold:

  • find ethical and sustainable businesses near you
  • tell them what matters to you
  • see how our spending can do good

Let’s unpack how and why it works so well.

What is CoGo?

is a platform dedicated to businesses that are taking action on ethics and sustainability, helping you connect to companies that share your priorities. After downloading the app you select the values that matter most to you, link your payment card, and find businesses nearby that are operating in line with what you care about, helping you to divert your purchasing choices to more ethical options.

isn’t actually a payment platform itself, it’s more like a directory, but by linking your card number (without the three digit security number) it is able to help you track your good spending every time you shop with a CoGo business and send anonymous data back to businesses to show them that sustainability really does matter to people, encouraging them to continue seeking better practices.

The aim is to create a positive feedback loop between conscious consumers and businesses that care, prompting more progress on both sides. For business owners, provides an insight on what existing and potential consumers care about, helping them design and implement new sustainable strategies effectively in the journey of improving and growing. Whilst payments are kept completely anonymous, overall consumer data on values and spending habits are shared with  businesses, showing them just how the changes they make are really having an impact. As a consumer, by joining the platform and linking your card you add more information from your personal consumer choices, providing concrete statistics to motivate businesses to become better, faster.

How it works

After success in New Zealand, has just launched in the UK. It’s the first app to allow you to shop across both sectors and issues, and already has 68 businesses in over 400 locations signed up, and although their main focus is currently on London, they plan to expand across the UK this year. The app features businesses from areas such as fashion, food and drink, grocery, homeware and beauty, and highlights values such as low carbon, slavery-free, and diverse and inclusive workplaces. The app will recommend new businesses based on your values and location, while the explore feature lets you discover even more ethical options.

Businesses who join have to be verified through the CoGo impact framework. The impact team monitor accreditations and calculate the efforts that businesses are making to address global issues, in order to make sure consumers can trust that these businesses practice what they preach. Their long term goal is to create a world-class accreditation system. They incorporate credible certifications, standards and NGO programme ratings, such as the Fairtrade Mark and Global Organic Textile Standard, into all product badge standards, and work in partnership with these certifiers.

CoGo businesses are already doing a lot of good. For example, so far they have diverted 2,055 tonnes of waste from landfill and donated £147,727 to help those in need each year!

Making our voices heard

But beyond a directory of businesses who are doing better, provides a means to communicate collectively with these businesses too.

technology securely links with your card through Fidel. As they don’t collect your card’s three-digit security number your card can’t ever be charged, but will provide an opportunity for you to contribute to their data without having to worry about privacy. It’s not about seeing what I, Francesca, bought, but sending an anonymous collective signal to businesses that indicates why they should value sustainability (for example: ‘78% of your customers who use CoGo want to support businesses that reduce their packaging waste’ is going to encourage businesses to adopt this practice).

It’s kind of like taking part in a continual anonymous survey without having to do anything beyond making the choices you already make, and the impact team can then use this to help businesses implement more sustainable policies. Their Impact Model details how plan to use their platform to push all businesses towards sustainable operations.

Thanks to consumers using  since their first launch of this technology in New Zealand, they’ve already seen:

  • 329 tonnes of recyclables diverted from landfill
  • £39,174 donated to help communities and the environment
  • 5 businesses become Living Wage certified
  • 36,616 items of disposable packaging avoiding landfill
Simultaneously, their ability to collect reliable and trusted information on consumer habits also puts in the position to educate and motivate the big players to change too. While we can’t expect everyone to change overnight, targeting the right organisations and sending messages to the right place can have a big impact. Just like voting, businesses aren’t likely to care about the opinions of people who aren’t ever going to shop with them, however they are likely to change if there’s a chance you would be their customer if they did better. is able to put concrete numbers to that sentiment. While it would be better if businesses changed because of morality, in the meantime speaking their language is the best way to prompt action.

A holistic approach

More than anything, is a tool that not only makes daily sustainable habits more achievable, it also makes collaboration more accessible. If you’re looking for vegan food, an organic salon or ethical fashion, it’s got options that are local to you and easy to find. But it also lets you tell these businesses something like: ‘I liked that vegan food, it’s why I chose to shop here, but I also care about your carbon footprint and how you treat your workers, why not look at that next?’ 

helps the small owners who are trying, connecting them to advice and understanding of where to focus their efforts. But it also provides a means with which to let industry leaders know that they need to catch up or get left behind. And all of this, it achieves simply through tracking some data. It allows you to be able to add your voice to the conversation, even when other barriers like time or accessibility may restrict you from other areas of discourse. It’s a means of finding better options, and finding better ways to communicate, which is a concept I can get behind 100%.

Overall it’s an app that’s simple to use, smart in its impact model, and steadily pushing industries, both big and small, to change for the better, all while helping you find a more ethical option that’s local to you.