The future of greenwashing and consumer confusion
July 6th, 2009Many private organizations provide services, products, solutions, ideas etc. for assisting companies and organizations in grasping the concept of green and putting it to practice. Great attention is given to information and reporting standardization such as CSR reporting, communication campaigns and other but what happens with the standardization of the theory and practice of “green”?
There is a tremendous amount of content being created on a daily basis regarding green and eco especially in the tourism sector. Green and eco hotels, green travel, responsible tourism and other related themes are a top subject.
The written content is mostly available in English and this is a pity but it is already very good that it is available as it can be translated.
A rather large number of journalists & content publishers, many times misled from appearances or for other reasons, end up calling anything green and eco. On the other side many give their best shot for exposing greenwashing and giving the public key information for making informed choices.
So today we find our selves in a situation internationally where anyone calls anything green & sustainable and equally anyone can questions anything carrying such a tag, label or name.
What matters is how big is the organization that says it, how much it can invest in marketing its’ self and not if this organization implements its decision making based on an internationally accepted framework or has a strategy for involving stakeholders or consumers in the decision making process.
So is this it? Is the era of green & sustainability awareness and change stagnated already? Is this what we have been trying to create for the last decades? a confusing and complex context with overlapping or conflicting information without a framework or limitations of any kind within which all of us should act?
“green” as a theme and as a concept, is on the verge of collapsing due to extensive greenwashing and overuse which have led to the saturation of the term and its multiple meanings.
Consumers are getting misled and confused by the vast interpretations of green / eco / sustainable / responsible. Some, more intrigued, go a bit deeper for understanding the true meaning of each green tag, label or symbolic use of the word, but one can get utterly confused.
On the other hand, following the destructive logic of quantitative analysis for trying to understand this trend, several private organizations are trying to quantify the green trend for presenting it as a fully quantifiable demand based on which companies can make the decision of going green or not and if they do choose to go green, how much should be invested for that niche or mainstream market deriving from the green trend.
As a result of that a large number of business managers and especially those responsible for sales & marketing, are trying to put everything on a spreadsheet for comparing advertising to certification and to a donation to a non-profit and trying to understand which brings more sales for the lower price and the minimum possible effort. As a chain reaction extreme greenwashing service providers present services which can make it happen for less than 199$ with an online payment!
What is the solution? Many suggest that labeling, taging, certifying and naming in any way a service, a product, an idea or a process green or sustainable should be regulated through government bodies or inter-governmental organizations such as the UN or the EC. Some even suggest that the only way of having a true sustainable outcome is by regulating such aspects through direct legislation.
Experience has shown that extensive regulation may have negative effects on the implementation as it leads to long procedures, bureaucracy, high costs, longer processes and in many countries corruption allows the bypassing of such regulations.
Food for thought.
Related posts:
PRfriend Products:
Ten Ways to Use Fashion Marketing in Your Organization
The Internet Marketing Strategy Calendar
My Top 22 Promotional Marketing Techniques
Corporate Social Responsibility and Growth
Ten Steps to Business Marketing Success