In reading this article today, I was brought to the site of an agency (TerraChoice) that has developed a laudable, inspired program to cut down on the act of "greenwashing." What is greenwashing, you ask?
Greenwashing is "the act of misleading consumers regarding the environmental practices of a company or the environmental benefits of a product or service." To that end, the agency has created a nifty campaign titled, "The Six Sins of Greenwashing" and you can download the report in full...as well as a wallet card that will aid in greener purchasing.
The wallet card is especially neat as it breaks down the information into an easier format featuring six questions--that map to the "six sins"--for consumers to use as a guide when making product purchases.
Overall, the campaign is darn cute, well-intentioned and handy. In other words, all the oh-so-clever things I rave about.
And here comes the BUT.
Problem is, even in a great format, we are still asking consumers to do a lot of critical thinking. According to the six questions, consumers will need to assess areas like (1) hidden proof, (2) vagueness, (3) irrelevance, (4) fibbing and a few more.
That's a lotta action points.
With. Every. Single. Purchase.
What's more? We're asking consumers to do this critical thinking when they're at places like the supermarket.
And at the hardware store.
At WalMart.
But navigating through the metropolis that is your local WalMart--with two kids in tow, no less--demands an abundance of focus and energy on its own, no?
Yet what so many marketers--the six sins being but one example--are expecting of consumers is to assess if the product they're about to buy is really green, just sorta green, too suspicious to be green...or the same product with a tree next to its logo for good measure.
Not gonna happen. (I'll bet green money on it)
With big-ticket, high-involvement purchases--like cars--then, sure, people are prone to run through a battery of
internal Q&A before acting. But that is the purchase exception and far from the rule. The rule is that people don't have that type of bandwidth when making every day, split-second purchase decisions.
And it's those everyday, split-second purchasing decisions that will have
the most impact.
The fact is, besides large companies making viable choices in how they can operate more efficiently--and getting global buy-in from major energy economies like China, too-- it's the gazillions of actions and billions of purchases that consumers make day-in/day-out that are going to make the BIG differences.
Some of those actions include unplugging your cellphone charger when not needed, decreasing AC and heat usage by a few degrees or bringing your own re-usable bags to the grocery store. Others will be to buy more efficient light bulbs and greener cleaning supplies.
The other problem? Marketers (of course).
Marketers pore through hours of copy and brainstorming
sessions to plot how their product can claim green-ness. Some marketers can easily claim this, others have to bend the truth. And others outright lie.
Even the agency's CEO knows we're asking much too much--this is how the article ends: "With such a barrage of eco-messages slapped on products these days
even McDougall concedes that "the six sins of greenwashing" might be
too much for consumers to remember when out shopping.
So, in a
nutshell, what's his advice? 'The most essential guide I can
offer consumers is; choose the product that appears to be doing its
best to educate you, to offer you information and in precise language.'"
Ergo, winning the green fight--or winning "green revenues," depending upon how you look at it--is an object lesson in simplicity (and, I'd argue, believability). That does not mean it can't be creative, but it needs to be simply so.
Regulatory agencies are going to need to lay down the law of what can be green-stamped and what constitutes greenwashing. But marketers need to make this process easy if they want for consumers to buy in and, um, buy from them.
Because if I can't spend the time vetting six questions--and I'm a marketer in the 1% who obsesses over product messaging in my local supermarket--I can promise you that the remaining 99% won't either. Sustainable strategies for greening the mainstream is what I seek (and in marketing Mother Earth, simple is my mantra.)
PS: As for fellow marketers? The wallet card and that full report are very much worth checking out right here.