Etsy Makes Progress on 2020 Impact Strategy and Shares 2021 Impact Goals
Etsy’s mission — to “Keep Commerce Human” — guides our daily decisions, sets the path for our long-term success and reinforces our commitment to make a positive social, economic, and ecological impact. Our Impact strategy is centered around using business as a force for good across both of our marketplaces: Etsy, the global destination for unique and creative goods, and Reverb, a leading global online marketplace for musical instruments.
We apply the same focus, discipline, and accountability to our Impact metrics as we do our financial metrics. Together, they make us stronger and more resilient. We are proud to take progressive action when it comes to our reporting. In 2019, we were among the first public companies to file an integrated report to the SEC, including both our financial disclosures and a deep dive into our impact work. And we will continue to hold ourselves accountable by sharing consistent, insightful reporting in order to accurately assess progress.
You can find our full report on Etsy’s Impact strategy, including 2020 progress highlights, as well as our updated goals in our latest Form 10-K.
In 2020, we made significant headway across all three of our focus areas, including:
- Economic Impact: We met our goal to double Etsy seller’s U.S. economic output by 2023, well ahead of schedule. Overall, U.S. Etsy sellers contributed $13 billion to the U.S. economy in 2020, up 142% from our baseline;
- Social Impact: We continued to attract and retain world-class talent, with a keen focus on diversity and gender balance. In 2020, Etsy (excluding Reverb) more than doubled the percentage of our leadership level employee population who identify as an underrepresented minority; and, stayed on track to achieve our goal of approximately doubling the percentage of U.S. employees at Etsy who identify as Black, Latinx or Native American by 2023.
- Ecological Impact: We met our 2020 goal to source 100% of our electricity from renewable energy; we also met our goal to run a carbon neutral business in 2020. Additionally, Reverb began offsetting 100% emissions from shipping.
2020 was an unprecedented year due to the global pandemic and broad social issues impacting our team and the communities we serve. With our Impact strategy as a north star, we were agile and stepped up our efforts well beyond the scope of the original goals we had outlined for 2020, all while working in a remote environment. Additional 2020 Impact work included:
- Direct support for sellers: We expanded education to help them manage their shops through this challenging time, implemented seller fee reduction, expanded our marketing strategies to further support and feature underrepresented minority sellers in our marketplaces, and launched advocacy campaigns in the U.S., UK and Europe for COVID-19 relief for small businesses, the self-employed and sole proprietor, such as Etsy sellers;
- Philanthropy: Over $2.6M in charitable gifts made including support for over 115k in mask donations in the US and UK and grants to community organizations and programs that enable creative entrepreneurship, advance racial justice and help those most impacted by the pandemic.
- Expanded Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Investments: We further expanded our already robust DEI program while pivoting hiring, engagement, mentorship and our Employee Resource Group program to a remote environment.
We started off 2021 by making some important new commitments related to our ecological impact, including:
- Science Based Goals: In January 2021, we set long-term carbon-reduction goals that are aligned with science, doing our part to prevent the worst effects of climate change. Our new Net Zero by 2030 goal includes a 50% absolute reduction in our Scope 1 and Scope 2 greenhouse gas emissions and a 13.5% absolute reduction in our Scope 3 greenhouse gas emissions.
- New TCFD Framework: We have added the Task Force on Climate Disclosures (“TCFD”) framework, in addition to using The Sustainability Accounting Standards Board’s (“SASBs”) framework, to our Impact reporting in order to provide enhanced climate-related disclosures.
Looking forward, we have more exciting business strategy-aligned Impact work in the pipeline. You can find details of our 2021 goals for each of our impact pillars:
We’ll continue to bring you more updates throughout the year, commentary and deep dives into the issues we are tackling here on Medium, so follow Etsy Impact for regular updates.
