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Its a soundand smellcar commuters have become intimately familiar with: the noxious fumes of asphalt repaving. U.S. road maintenance and highway expansion require a massive quantity of asphalt every year, roughly 400 million tons a year on average, according to Asphalt magazine, a publication of the international trade association Asphalt Institute. But a new process developed by St. Louis-based firm Verde Resources seeks to streamline the process, making it more sustainable and odorless. Verdes new BioAsphalt process, which has been in development since 2022, utilizes whats called biochar, or natural wood remnants from forestry waste that get added into the traditional asphalt material mixture of limestone and granite aggregates. This allows the road mixture to sequester a small amount of carbon. Verde CEO Jack Wong estimates that for every 100 tons of BioAsphalt that gets laid, 10 tons of carbon dioxide gets sequestered. Were essentially creating a no-brainer model for the industry to transition to, making the product as competitive as traditional asphalt with environmental advantages and benefits, Wong says. Asphalts environmental footprint is significant. In addition to using petroleum-based materials and requiring extensive energy for heating and installation, it also releases dangerous particulate matter as cars and trucks drive atop it. The National Asphalt Pavement Association estimated that laying down the material results in 20 million metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions annually in the U.S.; for comparison, thats about one-seventh the amount of emissions created by the nations commercial airline industry. Earlier this summer, BioAsphalt passed the initial stages of a test at the National Center for Asphalt Technology at Auburn University in Alabama. A section of BioAsphalt roadway was tested for a year, with staff running modified 80-ton trucks across the test bed to verify its durability. The material, one of a handful trying to make asphalt less environmentally damaging, has been given an okay for lower-impact applications like local roads and parking lots. “We’ve had plenty of materials and ideas come through the test track over the years, but few show the carbon reduction potential that Verde’s Biochar Asphalt does, and it’s definitely the first technology on the track with a carbon sequestration component,” said Nathan Moore, assistant director for test track research at NCAT, in a statement. While the early validation confirms its suitability for light-duty pavements, continuous evaluations are underway to determine its long-term viability for medium- to high-traffic roadways and even runways, as part of NCAT’s multiyear test cycle. The secret to Verdes process is a proprietary emulsifying agent that blends with a liquid asphalt binder to create a specialized emulsion, bonding the biochar and aggregate. This offers an alternative to the petroleum-based bitumen that traditionally binds roads Wong wouldnt reveal the exact additives in the firms process, other than to say theyre nonhazardous. A self-proclaimed Dune fan, he calls them spice. But they bond the roadway mixture without needing the heat required during the traditional asphalt laying process, which can hit 300 degrees Fahrenheit. This opens up new opportunities for the road construction industry. On-site crews dont need to cart gas canisters or additional gear to heat up the asphalt, so they can travel more lightly. In addition, since heat isnt needed in the application process, they can work longer into the cold months of the year, expanding when they can repair and resurface roads and parking lots. This also means that the factories that make the asphalt mix dont need to use heat as well. Wong added that while the BioAsphalt is about 15% to 20% more expensive to make, by weight, due to the different materials, its engineered to require a thinner layer when applied. So it actually ends up being slightly cheaper when energy savings and reduced material volume are factored in. Wong hopes to scale up quickly. BioAsphalt doesnt need to be heated with traditional furnaces, but it can be made in the same factory settings as traditional asphaltmeaning that existing infrastructure can make the mix without needing to spend money on powering industrial furnaces. Verde is working with Ergon Asphalt & Emulsions, one of the largest liquid asphalt producers in North America, on arranging distribution and licensing the proprietary process to other producers. Wong hopes to ramp up production substantially in the next year and eventually capture 10% of the market. Roadways, of course, arent just sources of pollution themselves. But they can be considered fossil fuel infrastructure because they support the use of cars and trucks burning gasoline and diesel fuel. In response, Wong says that he feels Verde’s product offers a practical way to immediately reduce emissions that go into roadway repair and expansion. Were providing an immediate solution to the day-to-day needs for our very robust and mature road network, Wong says.
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E-Commerce
A makeup illusionist, a photography project, and an innovative DJ are among the winners of Instagrams inaugural Rings awards. The award, whose recipients were announced on Thursday, celebrates 25 creators who, in the companys words, bring people together over creativity and arent afraid to take creative chances and do it their way. Among the winners is Mimi Choi, known for turning her face into mind-bending works of art. Celebrating her win, she penned in an Instagram post: Because of its visual nature, Instagram has really helped spread my work and jump-start my career, providing me with numerous different types of collaboration opportunities that I couldnt have even dreamed of when I began this journey. Then there’s Life on Film. Run by Grant Weintrob, Christian Baiocco, and Griffin Katz, the Instagram-first creative project hands out disposable cameras to strangers, as well as to some recognizable faces, turning their candid shots into cinematic Reels. [Image: Instagram] DJ AG Online, another winner, has accrued tens of millions of views online by transforming the streets of London into spontaneous DJ sets. Self-identifying as an open format DJ, he joins the list of creatives awarded with both a physical gold ring designed by Grace Wales Bonner and a golden halo that sits around their profiles. The full list of 2025 winners are Aki and Koichi, Ari Miller, Brian Lindo, Chris Brickley, Cole Bennett, Ashley Gordon, Dolly Singh, Elyse Myers, Futuradosmil, Gabriel Moses, Golloria, Laufey, lifeonfilm, Linda Lomelino, Mimi Choi, Nigel Sylvester, Mika Ninagawa, Olivia Dean, Adrian Per, Sebastian Jern, Katie Krejci, Mohammed and Humaid Hadban, Thalita and Gabriela Zukeram, Tyshawn Jones, and Zarna Garg. While many of the winners have established followings, that wasnt a factor in the judging process. Instead, each winner was honored by their peers. A panel of creativesspanning fashion and makeup to sports and entertainmenteach nominated their own favorite creators and voted on which 25 of Instagrams 3 billion users would be among the first to receive the honor. [Image: Instagram] The panel of judges included fashion and jewelry designer Grace Wales Bonner, who designed the gold ring each winner will receive; movie director Spike Lee; fashion designer Marc Jacobs; artist Kaws; makeup artist Pat McGrath; influencer Marques Brownlee, aka MKBHD; actress Yara Shahidi; pastry chef Cédric Grolet; Olympic rugby player Ilona Maher; music producer and songwriter Tainy; photographer Murad Osmann; Instagram exec and fashion journalist Eva Chen; and head of Intagram Adam Mosseri. This award is for the creators who dont just participate in culturebut shift it, break through whatever barrier holds them back to realize their ambitions. Because every act of creativity, big or small, can lead to something great,” Instagram said in its press release. Were witnessing a new era of digital entertainment, Maria Rodriguez, vice president of marketing and communications at Open Influence, a creator marketing company, told Fast Company. Just as the Oscars, Emmys, and Grammys celebrate excellence in film, television, and music, its only fitting that we recognize the talent, innovation, and artistry thriving on the platforms where audiences now spend most of their time. Keep an eye out for the exclusive gold ring around each winners profile.
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E-Commerce
There’s no shortage of inspiration for what to do with a part of the house that’s not quite looking its best. Interior design magazines and furniture blogs are stuffed with idealized bedrooms, and online vision boards make it easy to cast a dragnet over the myriad images of classy lounges or perfectly ordered home offices. But there’s always the unavoidable catch that while these images may be helpful references for how to rethink a room, they don’t actually represent your room. A new AI tool offers a more personalized alternative. Created by the online interior design service Havenly, it’s an app-based AI design assistant that takes user-submitted images of rooms and instantly offers modifiable design alternatives. Using AI image generation and a chatbot-based conversation about the type of design a user wants, the tool quickly pops out multiple options, with prompts to add or change things. An interactive interface allows users to swap out or even buy actual products and furnishings shown in the design concepts. [Image: Havenly] “It’s built on real design,” says Havenly CEO Lee Mayer. She cofounded the company in 2014, and for the past several years Havenly has been collecting its online design work in a broad database that covers more than 2 million individual design decisions and data points. Combining that with the inventories of several furnishings brands Havenly has acquired over the years, the company had the raw training materials for a large language model, the backbone of AI chatbots like ChatGPT. [Image: Havenly] “You’ve got products, you can shop those products, you can say I want to swap this product for that product and sort of see that in the space,” Mayer says. “It’s a really great tool to play and tinker and maybe even design your home. It’s not as fully featured and fully figured as a design experience would be, but it’s quite a big step above some of the LLM models that are out there, just in terms of your ability to execute on the design.” [Image: Havenly] Designing an AI design assistant The tool was developed almost unintentionally. Havenly, which pairs users virtually with interior designers who offer consultations online, was having trouble keeping up with the demand for human designers. “One of the things we started to do last year was really invest in automation-based tooling for our designers themselves, largely so they could service more people as well and as effectively as they could,” Mayer says. It was essentially a time saver that lets AI handle the top-line design questions of a project before pulling in a human design expert. As the company was developing the tool for this internal purpose, they started to play with it. “We realized it was kind of fun,” Mayer says. “Why not expose it to the consumer?” [Image: Havenly] Now available as a beta version on Havenly’s iOS app, the AI design assistant is a free way for users to start to visualize what a redesigned room could become. Testing out the tool ahead of its official launch, I asked it to offer some ideas for a few places in my own house. Not unlike my experiences with other AI chatbots that have emerged in recent years, the process was sometimes a bit clunky and confused. My first request was for ideas on filling a small space beneath a window in a children’s playroom with either storage, a bench, or a small table. Apparently caught up by the part of my prompt noting that this was located in a spare bedroom, the tool generated three fully outfitted bedroom designs. When I tried to clarify, the chatbot seemed to understand what I was looking for but then gave me three more bedroom designs. Switching to a less-specific approach, I uploaded an image of my house’s entryway and asked for suggestions on improving coat and shoe storage. The designs the tool offered were straightforward and useful, and the overall look largely matched the existing entry, albeit with much nicer furnishings. While I’m not likely to spend $600 on the small shoe shelf one design included, it did prompt some thinking about how I could more efficiently manage what can often become a jumble. [Image: Havenly] For some users, this could easily become a gateway to buying that shoe shelf (from Havenly) or opting for a paid design service (from Havenly). It could also be a more informed way for people to rethink their space without the information overload of the internet. “Where we are in the AI wave is just understanding what people want with it and how they interact with it. I think our initial hypothesis is there is a group of people that frankly don’t need full design help,” Mayer says. “Is it perfect? No. Does it replace the designer? I don’t think so.” But it can help solve problems. Mayer says one of the beta users had more than 200 back-and-forth exchanges with the chatbot to refine ideas for upgrading a basement space. Even Mayer herself has put the tool to use, asking it to help outfit a guest bedroom on short notice. “I had guests coming within three weeks. I needed to place orders that day. I was like, all right, let’s just see what it comes up with,” she says. After a few minutes chatting with the bot, Mayer got a design that fit the room and furnishings that fit the budget. “I placed the orders,” she says. “I got the rug, the bed, and the bedding.”
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E-Commerce
When companies undergo a major change, such as a CEO transition, reorganization, merger, or acquisition, most leaders default to one well-worn instinct: control the message. Lock down talking points. Tighten the language. Make it polished and official. In working with executive teams across industries, from tech to retail, weve seen time and again that simply trying to control the message isnt enough. In fact, it often has the opposite effect, creating more confusion and mistrust than clarity. Because in every high-stakes moment, your audienceemployees, customers, investorsis asking the same unspoken question: Whats in it for me? And if youre not answering it, someone else will. Why WIIFM isnt a selfish question For years, the phrase Whats in it for me? (or WIIFM) has gotten a bad rap. Leaders dismiss it as self-centered or marketing fluff. Not a serious strategy. But the opposite is true: WIIFM is one of the most powerful lenses available to a leader navigating complex change. Its not about pandering. Its about making strategy personal and anticipating needs. When people understand how a change will impact them, theyre far more likely to align with it, advocate for it, and stick around to help execute it. WIIFM isnt about promising perks or pay raises. Its about translating organizational ambition into something timely and tangible for the people you need on board. Weve seen this across the board: in mergers and acquisitions where alignment felt impossible, in CEO transitions where trust was on the line, and in executive team restructurings where internal politics threatened progress. Leaders who start with WIIFM consistently build momentum, while those who skip it often lose the narrative . . . and the talent. What happens when leaders skip the WIIFM moment Not long ago, we worked with a company making an acquisition. The executive team was excited about the deal and confident about the shared mission, but in those critical first weeks after the announcement, they froze. Without all the answers in place, they waited to finalize every detail before they communicated anything to the acquired organization. During that time, the acquired organization was left to speculate. Rumors flew. Teams filled in the blanks. Fear took over. By the time the executive team had the certainty the acquired company was looking for and formal messaging landed, it was too late. Some talent had moved on, and for the rest, they were left with months of unwinding the rumors and working from a deficit to rebuild trust. We see this pattern again and again: silence creates space for confusion. In the absence of clarity, people default to self-protection and assume the worst. The longer the silence lingers, the further they go down the rabbit hole. But when leaders show up early, even if all the answers arent yet clear, and acknowledge the WIIFM questions head-on, they build trust. As one client told us, When you show your face, you get the benefit of the doubt. By anticipating their needs, you can limit their anxieties and show that you considered how they may be impacted. How to answer Whats in it for me? (without saying those exact words) Lets be clear: this isnt about scripting new taglines. Its about pausing to ask a better question before you write the message. Before announcing any change, take five minutes to ask: What might my audience be worried about right now? What might they hope this change will solve for them? What could this feel like from their seat? As one senior leader we worked with put it: People don’t expect their leaders to have all the answersthey expect presence. Leaders must be transparent, empathetic, and engaged in navigating change alongside their teams.” One message, many audiences: How to stay consistent One of the biggest hesitations we hear from executives is: How do I tailor the message without creating inconsistencies? The answer is to identify a core message and then deliver it in audience-relevant language. Your strategy may not change, but the way you communicate it will. For example, your core message might be: Were evolving our structure to accelerate innovation. For employees, that might sound like: Were investing in clearer roles and fewer bottlenecks so teams can move faster and focus more on the work that matters. For customers: This means quicker product releases, better service, and less lag time. For investors: We expect this change to improve speed-to-market and reduce operating inefficiencies. Each message serves the same strategy. But each audience hears what matters most to them. Four prompts to make it personal Weve developed four simple prompts that help leaders shift their communication from top-down announcements to audience-centered leadership: What are they worried about losing?Security? Status? Control? Address it head-on. What might they gain?New opportunities, visibility, development, autonomyspell it out. But dont make any promises. What does this mean for them in the next 30, 60, 90 days?Use time as a grounding tool and a project management asset. This may present an opportunity to reengage with the audience after each benchmark. What will we be transparent about even if we dont have all the answers yet?Uncertainty is okay. Silence is not. These prompts do more than clarify the messaging. They help you show up as a leader who gets it and who doesnt just recite vision statements but connects them to the lived realities. Leading in the uncertainty gap As leaders, we often feel the pressure to have everything figured out before we speak up. But that instinct is counterproductive. Waiting for perfect information, especially in M&A scenarios, means youve already lost the room. As ProjectNext senior advisor Connie Rawson often reminds our clients, Even saying, We dont have all the answers yet, but heres what you can expect in the next 30 days, creates more stability than radio silence. Because the real risk isnt in saying the wrong thing, its in saying nothing at all. In an era where trust is harder to earn and easier to lose, hierarchical authority doesnt command unbridled loyalty the way it used to. People want clarity, connection, and honesty. They deserve it. The good news? WIIFM isnt just a tool for crisis moments. Its a muscle you can build into your everyday leadership. When you consistently make strategy personal across teams, stakeholders, and situations, you dont just manage chage. You lead through it.
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E-Commerce
Prior to becoming the CEO of Lyft, David Risher didnt post much on social media. That began to change just before his first day on the job, when Risher decided to sign up on the ride sharing platform as a driver. I had no plan, he says. I just wanted to get in the car and see what it feels like to drive for Lyft and hear the riders story, but also experience it from a driver’s perspective. At the end of that first outing, Risher revealed to the passenger who he was, and requested a selfie. He posted it on his personal LinkedIn account. I drove for a couple more hours and I didn’t tell anyone at Lyft I was doing this. Since then, Risher has made a regular habit of getting behind the wheel and sharing the stories (and selfies) he gathers from the road on his personal LinkedIn and X accounts, which have since added about 25,000 followers. Part of a CEO’s job is to be an external spokesperson for the company. The thing that I get the most consistent positive feedback on is my social media posts, particularly around driving, or pulling back the curtain on what it’s really like to run a company, Risher says. People trust individuals more than they trust institutions so I think it is important for Lyft. I kind of just want people to know CEOs are just people. As the personal brand of CEOs becomes increasingly tied to the brand of the companies they lead their voice, their interests, their faces more and more top bosses are taking pages out of the books of influencers. But is the expectation to whip out a phone and lead a TikTok Live changing the way these leaders function, and is it too much for a role thats already all-consuming? In this paid Premium story, youll: Learn whats driving this new expectation for chief executives Hear more from Lyft CEO David Risher The risk of turning your CEO into an influencer The age of the Chief Promotional Officer Risher isnt the only chief executive blurring the lines between business leader and social media influencer. According to author, personal branding expert and the founder and president of Sterling Marketing Group, Karen Leland, CEOs are under increased pressure to have an active online presence. People don’t just look at the company, they look at the brand of the CEO and the executives. They want to know how that person is putting themselves out there, she says. The CEO becomes almost like the chief promotional officer. Not only are potential customers interested in the CEOs online presence, according to Leland who has helped hundreds of Fortune 500 and Inc. 1,000 CEOs develop their online personas but so are prospective employees and investors. In a 2020 survey of global executives, 59% said their CEOs should have an online presence. In another, 74% of employees said customers associate their company with its executives. Other studies suggest that a positive CEO reputation can significantly improve an organizations ability to attract and retain investors, and can even positively impact their market value. To some degree, this isnt a novel idea. CEOs have been the faces of organizations for decades. But recently, stakeholders are expecting more, encouraging business leaders to fashion an authentic persona to connect with audiences the same way influencers do on YouTube, TikTok or Instagram. CEO branding as a discipline is fairly new, says Leland. Only in the last couple of years has it really gained traction. Leland even says its now common for CEOs to work with publicists to develop a personal narrative that is relevant to but distinct from the brand they represent. That could, for example, take the form of thought leadership, advocating for causes they care about, behind-the-scenes perspectives, and even personal interests and hobbies. Sir Richard Branson, for example, has long maintained a public persona closely connected to, but still distinct from, that of his companies, making frequent media appearances and posting on social media. Though Branson used to be the outlier his strategy has recently become the norm. Like Risher, many tech CEOs in particular have jumped on the branding bandwagon. As he transitioned from the COO of Shopify to CEO of Opendoor, Kaz Nejatian began posting on social media, sharing internal memos, and building his brand online. CEOs like Bumbles Whitney Wolfe Herd, Microsofts Satya Nadella, JPMorgan Chases Jamie Dimon, Ciscos Chuck Robbins, Best Buys Corie Barry, and many more have follower counts in the hundreds of thousands, or millions. CEOs as attention merchants? It may be inaccurate to group CEOs in the same camp as YouTubers or Twitch streamers, though. Influencers arent necessarily thought leaders, Leland says. But CEOs who do this right are establishing themselves as thought leaders in a particular domain. Recent media or conference appearances, product announcements, site visits, conversations with customers and employees, and other day-to-day responsibilities have all become fodder for a CEOs online content. I think today, it is a core responsibility, says Leland. If a CEO makes a lengthy, thought leadership-style post on LinkedIn that goes viral, its a huge branding opportunity for their company. But while there may be benefits to a strong social media presence for some CEOs, others may have more to lose than gain from the added visibility. Just as influencers get canceled for posting bad takes or faux pas online, so could more CEOs (and thus companies) who are following this influencer-ization model. There is this concomitant risk that goes along with it, says Jerry Colonna, an executive coach, author, and CEO of Reboot.IO. If they make a personal misstep, which every human being does, it’s not just the person who’s canceled it’s the brand. Colonna explains most people couldnt name the CEOs of most Fortune 100 companies, often because well-established organizations have the luxury of letting their products speak for themselves. At the same time, he says others Apple, Microsoft or Patagonia were more successful because of the public personas of their leaders than they could have been otherwise. As long as you’re doing it in an authentic way, then you’re probably doing good for your company, says Risher of Lyft. I think this is true for social media influence as well as for CEOs: if it feels forced, I don’t think you’re fooling anyone. While he has seen the pressure on CEOs to be more present on social media growing in recent years, Colonna who has gained a reputation as The CEO Whisperer for coaching countless prominent business leaders says the impact of their online presence has its limits. It can be really, really helpful, but it doesn’t solve the long term, build-the-business problem, he says. Because no matter how many likes and subscribes your CEO drives: You still have to deliver high quality products.
Category:
E-Commerce
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