Purpose
This study aims to think critically about collaborative working through the practical application of an ethics of care approach. The authors address the following research questions: How can the authors embed an ethics of care into academic collaboration? What are the benefits and challenges of this kind of collaborative approach? The contextual focus also incorporates a collective sense making of academic identities over the course of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Design/methodology/approach
The authors focus on the activities of the “Consumer Research with Impact for Society” collective at and around the 2021 Academy of Marketing conference. The authors draw on the insights and labour of the group in terms of individual and collaborative reflexivity, workshops and the development of a collaborative poem.

Findings
First, the authors present the “web of words” as the adopted approach to collaborative writing. Second, the authors consider the broader takeaways that have emerged from the collaboration in relation to blurring of boundaries, care in collaboration and transformations.

Originality/value
The overarching contribution of the paper is to introduce an Ethics of Collective Academic Care. The authors discuss three further contributions that emerged as central in its operationalisation: arts-based research, tensions and conflicts and structural issues. The application of the “web of words” approach also offers a template for an alternative means of engaging with, and representing, those involved in the research.