The Martlet

What happens when you take the “con” out of consumer? You get Zumer.com.

Zumer is an online database that allows individuals to go beyond the marketing spin and research the social and environmental impact of products they buy every day. It is being developed by UVic graduates and is currently in the testing phase. Hundreds of products, from toothpaste to shoes to beer, will be ranked and evaluated in four categories: environment, society, product responsibility and corporate citizenry.

“The company was founded with the mission of making corporate social responsibility performance more accessible to consumers so that people can start expanding what [considerations] they take into their purchases,” said Stephen Albinati, Zumer’s database project manager.

The database uses a Wikipedia-style open source format so anyone can contribute to the information pool.

“As long as it’s referenced information, it can be included,” said Albinati.

Zumer has also worked with UVic, Royal Roads University, and a Mexican university to have research projects integrated into class curricula. The students use company and external sources and scrutinize how companies perform in an assortment of areas. These reports are then incorporated into the database. Zumer is hoping to expand the program to include 10 universities throughout North America.

“There is a big push from a student organization, MBA Students with a Conscience, and we’re nailing a lot of their chapters,” Albinati explained.

The student research is based on the framework developed by the Global Reporting Initiative, a Dutch-based non-government organization. The framework is a 70-point voluntary system that gives companies a guideline on how to report sustainability information. To date, over 1,500 companies have reported according to the Global Reporting Initiative’s protocol, including over half the S&P 500.

“There’s a good piece of information to start with that is out there, and in a consistent manner,” said Albinati. “That equips people to start comparing companies within a rigorous format.”

The one drawback is that it is mostly large multi-nationals that have reported using the Global Reporting Initiative framework, making it harder to find information on smaller local companies. But Albinati said that’s the advantage of the open-source format.

“If you do have some information, put it in to Zumer — that’s the whole idea. If we were trying to do all the research in-house, there’s no way we could cover every company,” he said.

Eventually, he hopes that Zumer will influence more companies to become transparent, allowing consumers to make more informed purchases. Albinati can foresee a time when someone in the detergent aisle can bring up Zumer on their cellphone, punch in a bar code and trace the footprint of that product.