Zero Waste by Robin Murray, Greenpeace Environmental Trust 2002

The commodity-service economy
One of the results of these strategies is the emergence of a
‘new service economy’ in which manufacturers sell not
commodities but service packages to achieve required
outcomes. Manufacturing is transformed into a branch of
the service sector, producing goods that are judged
primarily on their performance as part of a service
package.
In the case of energy, facilities managers offer target levels
of power and comfort, and then employ an array of
technologies in addition to (reduced) energy inputs in
order to meet them. Rentokil offers pest control and
security rather than rat poison and locks. Dupont is
moving from supplying paint to the auto sector to
supplying painted car bodies. Xerox supplies copying
services. Fleet management offers mobility services for the
transport of goods. As with leased buildings and elevators,
such product + service provision is established and
growing.
These examples largely come from the commercial sector,
which is where the new commodity-service economy has
first taken hold. It is now extending to consumer goods.
Electrolux is supplying ‘washing services’ to households.
Unilever has launched a cleaning service, which it hopes to
extend into gardening services, providing the equipment
and inputs in each case. A leading oil company is
considering renting out oil as part of a lubrication service.
Car companies are preparing to sell mobility services, with
the consumer renting a given number of miles, supplied
through a leased car, with insurance, fuel, maintenance
and repairs provided. 51 In all these cases the commodity
moves away from the centre of the commercial transaction
and becomes what the industrial ecologists describe as ‘a
service delivery platform’.
shopping, child rearing, home caring and household
information management are all part of the domestic
economy. Toffler called it ‘pro-sumption’ and it now
extends not just to the daily tasks but to self-education, to
healthy living, and the management of a household’s
energy, water and waste.
The rise of commodity-plus-service reflects both changing
work patterns and the application of modern technology
in the home. Firms are now offering a ‘three star’ service
package or a package of commodities, with guarantees
and advice. In doing so they are changing their
orientation, placing a premium on the continuing serviceprovider/customer
relationship instead of the one-off
commodity sale.
These changes place the responsibility (and risk) for
product performance back with the manufacturer. As such
they are parallel to the movement towards producer
responsibility in waste. Taken together they enable issues
of product and material life cycles to be re-integrated with
the function of product design, opening out extraordinary
opportunities for design innovation geared to increased
material productivity and Zero Waste. For once the
revenue of service providers is based on outcomes and
they take responsibility for risk and waste, they have an
interest in minimising both as well as the specialist
capacity to do so.
The changes involved in such a shift are summarised in Ta b l e
2, drawing on the work of Walter Stahel and his colleagues.
One of the factors underlying this change is that so much
consumption involves work. Cooking, washing, cleaning,
gardening, house and car maintenance, travelling,
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