What if one simple habit after your next camping or fishing trip could dramatically reduce your environmental impact?

In this powerful episode of The Sustainable Angler, I sit down with Meg Carney, founder of The Outdoor Minimalist, to explore practical, honest, and hopeful solutions for protecting the places we love. Meg shares how conducting a personal waste audit after your outdoor adventures can uncover hidden waste and help you make smarter, lower-impact choices moving forward.

We also dive into urgent threats facing our public lands—including a proposed copper sulfide mine at the headwaters of the Boundary Waters. This is an action moment. Listeners are encouraged to contact their Senators and oppose HJ Res 140,the bill that would undo the 20-year mining ban near Minnesota’s Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness.

ACTION ALERT! Call your Senators TODAY (2/9/26)! Save the Boundary Waters has an excellent call script which takes less than a minute to protect our public lands and waters!

From there, the conversation turns to PFAS in the outdoor industry, highlighting brands working to eliminate these harmful “forever chemicals,” and a candid discussion about greenwashing—how to spot it, avoid it, and build real trust. Rick explains how tools like REI’s Product Impact Standards can guide brands toward transparency and authentic sustainability, and Meg shares the red flags she looks for—like missing sustainability pages or reports.

We close on a hopeful note: what’s giving Meg optimism about the future of outdoor stewardship, responsible brands, and a more sustainable industry.

If you care about clean water, honest sustainability, and protecting wild places for future generations, this is an episode you don’t want to miss.

What You’ll Learn in This Episode:

• How to conduct a simple waste audit after your next outdoor trip
• Why the Boundary Waters mining proposal matters—and how to take action
• The truth about PFAS in outdoor gear and who’s leading change
• How to recognize and avoid greenwashing in the outdoor industry
• Practical tools brands can use to build authentic sustainability
• Reasons for hope in the future of conservation and outdoor recreation

Take Action:
Call your U.S. Senators today and urge them to oppose HJ Res 140 to protect the Boundary Waters.

Connect with Meg Carney:
The Outdoor Minimalist

Subscribe & Follow:
Follow The Sustainable Angler for conversations at the intersection of conservation, responsible business, and the future of the outdoors.

Sponsors:

This episode is brought you you by: A New Earth Project, the sustainability initiative of Atlantic Packaging, Emerger Strategies, and Ecolytics (don't forget to mention The Sustainable Angler fo

🎣 Like what you heard?

Subscribe to The Sustainable Angler wherever you get your podcasts and leave a review to help us grow the conversation around sustainable business in the fishing and outdoor industries.

For more resources, or to learn how Emerger Strategies can help your brand turn sustainability into a competitive advantage by making it simple, strategic, and profitable, visit www.emergerstrategies.com.

Follow us on Instagram @emergerstrategies and @thesustainableangler and stay tuned for more insights from leaders at the intersection of conservation, business, and the outdoors.

In this episode of The Sustainable Angler, I’m joined by sustainability expert, author, and speaker Bob Willard, one of the world’s leading voices on making the business case for sustainability.

Bob shares his journey from the corporate world into sustainability leadership and unpacks key insights from his book, The Sustainability Advantage. We dive into how sustainability drives real business value—from reducing operating expenses and attracting and retaining top talent to what may be the most overlooked benefit of all: risk avoidance.

We also explore how brands can use cost–benefit analysis to evaluate sustainability projects, and Bob walks through his open-source tools, including the Basic Sustainability Assessment Tool, Advanced Sustainability Assessment Tool, the Future-Fit Business Benchmark, and the role of B Corps, where Bob serves as an advisor.

Along the way, we swap sustainability success stories, discuss the most underestimated advantages of sustainability, why sustainability feels so overwhelming for so many businesses, and—importantly—what gives Bob hope for the future.

If you’re a fishing or outdoor brand trying to cut through the noise, reduce risk, and build a stronger, more resilient business, this conversation will give you clarity, confidence, and practical next steps.

This episode is brought you you by: A New Earth Project, the sustainability initiative of Atlantic Packaging, Emerger Strategies, and Ecolytics (don't forget to mention The Sustainable Angler for a discount on your first year's subscription of Ecolytics!).

🎣 Like what you heard?

Subscribe to The Sustainable Angler wherever you get your podcasts and leave a review to help us grow the conversation around sustainable business in the fishing and outdoor industries.

For more resources, or to learn how Emerger Strategies can help your brand turn sustainability into a competitive advantage by making it simple, strategic, and profitable, visit www.emergerstrategies.com.

Follow us on Instagram @emergerstrategies and @thesustainableangler and stay tuned for more insights from leaders at the intersection of conservation, business, and the outdoors.

In this special crossover episode, we dive into some of the most essential—and urgent—topics facing our coasts and our communities. We kick things off with climate change and ocean acidification before breaking down what nature-based solutions really are, including real-world examples like living shorelines and how businesses can be part of the climate solution by reducing their greenhouse gas emissions.

Dr. Elizabeth Fly, Director of Resilience & Ocean Conservation at The Nature Conservancy and host of the podcast Conversing with Nature, shares insights on ecosystem resilience and the climate impacts already reshaping South Carolina’s coast. We discuss sea level rise, stronger hurricanes, heavier rainfall, droughts, urban heat, and what these changes mean for the places we love.

We also explore sustainable business, the Fly Fishing Climate Alliance, and Emerger Strategies’ newest service: Nature Strategy & Science-Based Targets for Nature. Elizabeth and I talk through the growing challenges tied to South Carolina’s rapid population growth and the urgent need for long-term planning. And finally, she takes us inside some of her fascinating climate research and the work happening on the ground to build a more resilient future.

This episode was an absolute blast to record and is packed with valuable takeaways for conservationists, business leaders, anglers, and anyone who cares about the future of our coastal communities.

🎣 Like what you heard?

Subscribe to The Sustainable Angler wherever you get your podcasts and leave a review to help us grow the conversation around sustainable business in the fishing and outdoor industries.

For more resources, or to learn how Emerger Strategies can help your brand turn sustainability into a competitive advantage by making it simple, strategic, and profitable, visit www.emergerstrategies.com.

Follow us on Instagram @emergerstrategies and @thesustainableangler and stay tuned for more insights from leaders at the intersection of conservation, business, and the outdoors.