Lauren Anderson: Principles of Collaboration Will Help Brands Stay Relevant

Written by Priti Ambani

Feb 14, 2014

CSW-Crowd-chat Lauren Anderson, Chief Knowledge Officer of Collaborative Lab, joined us to discuss the shifting consumer mindset toward sharing, the future of collaborative consumption, and how businesses can keep up in the February 13, 2014 Twitter #CrowdChat hosted by Crowdsourcing Week.

According to Lauren and other participants, the mindset over the sharing economy is changing-

  • At first, people considered collaborative consumption as a cool new thing to do – something more efficient and more social than ownership
  • Opening up new groups of people interested in sharing through tech has brought the behaviour to a mainstream level
  • What people discovered is that collaborative consumption is not just fun & efficient, but also strengthens community and can be sustainable too.
  • Cool tech was important to shift ‘sharing’ away from some of its more negative connotations.
  • Trend towards access over ownership is definitely going global with collaborative consumption activity from US, EU, Middle East, Asia, Africa, Pacific

Roadblocks include:

  • This is a hard situation for regulators and govts as collaborative consumption is largely operating in a legal grey area – no precedents.
  • Biggest hurdle is overcoming trust issues and also aspirational ownership. Need to demonstrate sharing can be more beneficial

There is a great potential for new business models centered on collaborative consumption and the following points were highlighted during the chat.

  • How can company tap into idling capacity of its assets? Borrow/rent rather than buy? Build strong community w critical mass? 
  • It isn’t about losing revenue, but instead creating additional revenue streams through rental, resale or brokering.
  • Transparency also critical as p2p marketplaces shift relationship away from biz-2-consumer – now consumers are at the core!
  • Businesses need to adopt “onward logistics” in supply chain as well as reverse logistics to incorporate cradle-to-cradle principles.
  • There are opportunities at every layer – from startup to industry to government – in 5 yrs should be integrated like sustainability.
  • While it’s not a silver bullet, we see collaborative consumption as an integral part of solution to a better greener happier way of life

Read the complete chat transcript below or on

About Author

About Author

Priti Ambani

Priti Ambani is the Global Media Director at Crowdsourcing Week, a thought leader and prominent writer on social enterprises, start-ups and web 2.0 businesses. Previously, Priti grew Ecopreneurist, a nascent green business blog into a notable social business resource as site director and managing editor. Working from the ground up, she has developed successful business and communications strategies for impact organizations that aim to create social, environment and economic wealth. Priti is a Professional Engineer and holds a Master’s degree in Biological Resources Engineering from the University of Maryland, College Park.Priti lives in the Washington DC Metro area with her husband and sons, is a lover of the outdoors, traveling and from-scratch cooking!

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