Using advertising revenues to plant trees, Henry Tran, BubblyTree

What is your own background briefly?

I am Henry, I am French and I live in London. I am the co-founder of Bubblytree. Back in 2016 , shortly after the COP21 in Paris, I felt the urge to make a positive impact to the planet and together with my friend Heylene, started BubblyTree with the aim to plant trees thanks to advertising revenues. We launched BubblyTree’s beta version platform in 2017 while working as auditors for financial services companies in London. Our first objective at BubblyTree is to plant 100K trees within 3 years, and 1million by our 5th year.

Does it seem like a logical background to what you do now?

I have a master’s in management and sustainability and used to volunteer for an environmental NGO.

I have been working in IT and technology audit, it was natural for me to use technology to build the project.

How was the last 12 months? What were your big wins?

We have reached 20,000 trees planted in Africa in the last 12 months. Last November 2019, we had our first conference as main speakers at the London event “Collective Power on the Planet” organised by the startup BagBoard. And shortly after, Cyrielle Hariel, a journalist and ‘changemaker’ based in Paris, interviewed us. This was a great interaction, as Cyrielle interviews changemakers around the world such as Nobel Prize Yunus Muhammad, Jane Goodall, Astronaut Thomas Pesquet, etc. and she is now presenting a TV show about CSR on one of the main French news TV channel BFMTV.

What would you have done differently?

We would have invested in social media management earlier. Since we have dedicated people helping us here, the traffic has increased and therefore we plant more trees.

1 min pitch for what you are doing now?

Everyone can plant a tree for free by watching an advertisement with BubblyTree. And the team behind BubblyTree works with our sponsors to facilitate planting these trees.

At BubblyTree we focus also on promoting sustainable brands that want to reduce carbon footprint by planting trees. We have planted 20,000 trees thanks to 20,000 ethical ad views so far with our ad partner Mosaiqe who makes eco-friendly watches. Our aim is to reach 100,000 trees planted this year.

Currently, we would like to run a campaign for cop26 in the UK to contribute to it and gain visibility for BubblyTree.

#BreatheForThePlanet, #Cop26,#BubblyTree.

This year, we would also like to focus on utilising the ‘momentum’ around the world in planting trees. A recent example of this momentum is Mr. Best, an American influencer who, with 40 million followers, planted 20 million trees with the help of high profile donations such as Elon Musk or Jack Dorsey.

Why did you get involved with sustainability?

I have always wanted to run my own sustainability-focused organization since I concluded studying sustainability at University.
I wanted to contribute to make a better planet for future generations.

Why do you think it is such a powerful idea?

“Watch an ethical ad and plant a tree for free” is powerful because, while many people out there may want to do something positive for the planet to offset climate change, they may not have the means to do so. BubblyTree offers everyone an easy and fun way to do this; all you have to do is give 50 seconds of your time to watch an ethical ad and we will plant a tree on your behalf.

We want Bubbly tree to be a positive and optimistic movement that promotes brands that are in the green economy to reduce the global carbon footprint and allows at the same time to plant trees to absorb the Co2 already emitted in the atmosphere since the industrial revolution.

We use advertising income to plant trees. This industry generates around 500 Billion dollars a year and we want to make use of this volume to plant trees. In addition, we plant our trees via the NGO “Trees for the future” who has a sustainable approach to tree planting i.e. triple bottom line approach (people, planet, profit).

Trees are planted in 6 African countries (Senegal, Kenya, Uguanda, Guinea, Tanzania, Cameroon) by local communities, which provides them income, food and the tree planting help the environment. Of course the trees absorb Co2 and produce oxygen, but they also help to retain the moisture and increase groundwater levels.

And because of this structure, trees planted with “Trees for the Future” have a high survival rate, as local communities take care of them for their subsistence. Our partner “Trees for the Future” does an amazing work and their sustainable methodology has been recognised by Bloomberg news recently. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-01-27/why-planting-a-trillion-trees-should-start-with-small-farmers

How do you explain the circular economy to those who ask you what it means?

The circular economy is all about making sure the whole lifecycle of a product is respectful/sustainable of the planet e.g. raw material and energy used, manufacturing, waste also has to be eco-friendly. An important aspect is us as consumers, who should demand products that are ‘good’ to the planet such as durable, made of recycled materials, etc.

How do you apply these concepts to your own business and what you do?

We engage and promote companies that are B Corp, eco -friendly, climate-neutral or embrace the concept of the circular economy. For example, our ad partner Mosaiqe who makes wooden watches with wood ethically sourced and plants 5 trees for every watched sold.

Throughout the setup of BubblyTree we also made sure to engage with companies with strong social and environmental values. For example, Officience is a social enterprise in Vietnam who made our website; Greengeek hosts our web platform and uses sustainable energy; and the logo design was done by FreeRange, who engages with companies who ‘do good’.

How can people find out more about you personally & your work?

First, they can visit our betaversion platform:

http://bubblytree.com

Cyrielle Hariel, French journalist, recognised as top 10 CSR influencer for 2020 by CSR managzine (RSE magazine), has recently talked about BubblyTree on French radio on the program “save the planet” of the 15th February 2020 :

There is also a Vlog on linkedin about us :
https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:6604637837809844224/

Who and where do you get inspiration from?

Our inspiration came from Ecosia, the Berlin based web browser that plant trees for free, the project “Dear Tomorrow” in NY, where people are encouraged to write a letter for the future in 2050 and explain what they have done against climate change, and Goodeed in Paris where you can watch an ad and donate to charity organisations.

Anything else you’d like to add / we should have asked?

We call people to follow us on social media: instagram, twitter, facebook, Linkedin. The more followers we have the more leverage we will have to have more sponsors and plant more trees. We are also happy to hear from people who would like to collaborate, either because they have an interest or have skills in the field.
#BubblyTree
@BubblyTree

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