Greenwashing (cont.) and the Need to Loosen Up

Jeffrey Hollender, the founder and CEO at Seventh Generation, published a counterpoint to my recent post, How Bad Is Greenwashing, Really? I encourage you to read it here.

I just responded on his site, and thought I'd share the conversation here. To wit:

Jeffrey,

Thanks for your comment. I've long admired your outspokenness on the topic of the green marketplace, and your willingness to be, as you describe yourself, an inspired protagonist.

I don't disagree with some of your points, but I think you missed mine. It wasn't about companies that can't handle criticism. And it wasn't about condoning companies that are being misleading or dishonest. As you well know, I have been an outspoken critic of greenwashing myself over the past twenty years.

But there is a tremendous amount of green activity going on in the world of business that doesn't fall into either category, and it deserves more than a little consideration and a knee-jerk response.

Nearly every big company these days is taking a hard look at its products, processes, and operations through the lens of environmental impacts, and many are making changes that reduce their impacts significantly, even though the changes may represent a small, even tiny, part of their operations. They are doing these things for a range of reasons — to cut costs, increase sales, attract and retain employees, reduce risks, and improve their reputations, among other reasons. Frankly, their motivations are unimportant, as far as I'm concerned. What's important is that they are engaged as never before.

The challenge most big companies face is how to make gradual changes without being pilloried for not being "good enough." Incrementally, after all, is how big companies change. Smaller, privately held firms like Seventh Generation can move much more quickly and boldly, especially when they have leaders as enlightened as you. But unfortunately, such companies are few and far between. The overwhelming majority of companies, especially big public ones, move much more slowly. Nonetheless, many are moving in a green direction, making changes both big and small. Yet I'm not aware of a single one that claims to be green.

Let's look at two of the examples you cite.

General Motors has created a promising technology that it plans to introduce in 2010. It is widely anticipated by most environmentalists and transportation experts as a viable and attractive solution to reducing the use of oil. GM is currently scrambling to unload its gas guzzlers and is working on selling its Hummer division. The company executives I've talked to are simultaneously humbled and hopeful about their future and are changing direction. I can assure you that no one at GM, from their chairman down, has claimed that they are green, or even close.

I checked the website of Procter & Gamble's Pure Essentials and didn't see any green claims. Yes, calling it "natural" is dubious at best, but it's hardly hardcore greenwash. Meanwhile, P&G has set a goal of selling $20 billion in sales of products with what it calls a "significantly reduced environmental footprint version of previous alternative products." (More on that here.) This may not fit your standard of "good enough," but it's hardly disingenuous.

Now, I'm not for a second claiming that either company is "green" — or even "good." Both have a long, long way to go, in my book. But both represent sea changes for companies with mega-billion-dollar worldwide impact. And my sense is that it is just the beginning, not the end, of their efforts in this regard.

(Full disclosure: GM is a client of GreenOrder, a sustainability strategy firm with which I am affiliated; I have no business relationship with P&G.)

It's not just GM and P&G, of course. There are dozens of other big companies trying to navigate similar paths — making changes while maintaining their market share and brand images, and doing it under the watchful eye of Wall Street, which has been anything but supportive of these efforts.

So, how should we view these companies? As polluting scam artists who should be scolded for deigning to talk about their efforts? Or as companies trying to shift directions, even if it's slower and more incremental than most of us would like? Do we beat them up or cheer them on?

I vote for the latter — always, of course, remaining watchful to make sure that their rhetoric doesn't get too far ahead of reality. In short, I think you — all of us — should loosen up a bit and give these companies some room to move — some rope on which to hang themselves, if you prefer. Transparency, as you point out, is key. I couldn't agree more.

Yes, there are more than a few companies that just don't get it — that are trying to put green lipstick on a pig by making environmental marketing claims that far outweigh the size of their efforts. (This includes many smaller companies, who all too frequently claim that we can "save the earth" by buying their organic socks, hemp soaps, or whatever. They're all good people making quality products, but their green marketing claims are sometimes outlandish, to say the least.) But for every company that doesn't get it, there are many more that are moving forward, however imperfectly. To dismiss every big company effort and statement as a "corporate disinformation campaign" needlessly tars both the leaders and the laggards with the same brush — and insults every earnest environmental professional in those companies who are trying — often against significant odds — to move the needle inside his or her company.

Like you, I'm concerned about the pace of change. I wish it were faster, and we need to keep the heat on companies to take bolder, more audacious actions. This is no time to celebrate small, symbolic measures.

But like it or not, we can't make the societal changes we need without the big guys. Seventh Generation is an admirable company, a true leader, but it alone can't address the significant environmental challenges we face. If the world's largest companies don't join in — well, your two decades of leadership will be all for naught.

Finally, since you brought it up — gratuitously, I might add — let me raise the Clorox issue, about which you've criticized me privately several times over the past few months. But since you've raised it publicly, I feel compelled to respond in kind. I did a small consulting project for Clorox for three months during 2007, acting as a sounding board for their outreach efforts in the run-up to the release of their Green Works cleaning line. My engagement, as I understood it, was to ensure that their messages were authentic and wouldn't overreach. I have done no work for them for nearly a year, and have disclosed my brief involvement with them whenever I've written about them.

If you'd like, I'd be happy to reveal to you offline the exact amount of money I received for these efforts, but to put it in perspective, it's a small fraction of the amount of money Seventh Generation paid me during the 1990s, when you were licensing a version of my green consumer newsletter.

Were all the laudatory things I wrote over the years about you and Seventh Generation (or were quoted as saying in the press) genuine, or just a symptom of my "clouded judgment"? You make the call.

Respectfully,

Joel

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Comments

[Jensen]

Great to see the back and forth discussion between blogs. It's nice to see some engagement between sustainability blogs. I hope it continues when warranted!

May I suggest . . . some sort of live greenwashing/green business roundtable that those of us in cyberspace can listen in/comment on in real time?

[Bogman]

It's all about following the money. If corporations see a chance to make more money by matching more actions with words, they'll do it. Right now, they aren't too sure there's money in dramatic actions.

What will that take? Consumers and B2B customers who understand what to expect from companies who are doing the right thing, and who will choose their products and services accordingly. And more pro-active government policies in promoting green alternatives in the market place.

But the conversation and some of the actions have come a looooong way from just a couple of years ago, and I think it's only go to accelerate exponentially. The public is looking for corporate heroes to save the environment, and barring that, the government.

[Sara Sweeney]

Thanks Joel -and Jeffrey, for the differing viewpoints on the subject of greenwashing. I do fall, however, more in Joel's "camp." We are in a huge -and I mean huge, paradigm shift, and it's not one that will happen overnight. Sometimes I feel that the Al Gore, and even Jeffrey Hollender, style rhetoric tends to confuse and paralyze people more than inspire them. And that's what we need -to inspire, to instill spirit. I believe it is happening, and that we are seeing change.

Do I wish it were happening faster? Do I think there is some green information out there that is just absolute bunk? Yes, absolutely. But I am grateful for the changes I do see. It is amazing to see how far we've come in just a few years. It will only continue to gain momentum.

I look forward to continued dialogue and education.

[Mark W. McElroy]

Hi Joel:

You and I have been around this course before. You say incremental forward movement is good; I say not necessarily good enough. Indeed, I say ostensible 'forward' movement by itself may be bad. Why? Two reasons.

One: It may not be 'forward' at all. Indeed, even a lower level of GHG emissions by a company this year as opposed to last, for example, may be less sustainable and less green, not more, since the assimilative capacity of the atmosphere may have declined at twice or thrice the rate of the same company's decline in emissions. Simple measures of (incremental) top-line changes tell us nothing about actual sustainability performance.

Two: The disconnect I explain above between incremental changes in environmental (and social) impacts a company may have on the world around it can have the effect of tolerating, if not encouraging, an interpretation of sustainability that (a) applauds so-called 'improvements' in performance, even as it (b) entails actual decreases in human and environmental well-being. Our collective understanding of sustainability suffers, accordingly.

Call me a nut, but I say that any school of sustainability theory and practice that tolerates and applauds impacts in the world that have the effect of actually degrading human and ecological well-being is morally bankrupt.

Of course I do not accuse you of having lined up intentionally behind such a school; I simply suggest that you have done so unintentionally. But now that I have brought this to your attention, what do you propose to do about it?

Regards,

Mark

[Laurens Laudowicz]

may i say congratulations? it seems as if in this round Joel is clearly the winner (if there is such thing when it comes to these topics)

Jeffrey Hollender...we are all listening. what is YOUR response?

[Reid Lifset]

I think that this debate has neglected a crucial aspect of greenwashing: what is the impact on the consumer and the general public? The discussion, as illustrated by the exchange between Joel Makower and Jeffry Hollender has centered on encouragement or discouragement that we (society) provide to companies to pursue sustainability. Clearly an important concern.
But what is the impact on purchasing and product use? Some allege confusion or "totemic" behavior (I think I saw that phrase in a post to Jeffry Hollender's blog). Others are more sanguine. Very few people, however, are systematically investigating this, especially in conjunction with greenwashing debates.

[David Wofford]

Dear Joel,

Thank you for sharing this debate. I wish Jeffrey's position was more thoughtful, and less angry (given away by the cheapshot at the end).

For me, the biggest problem with greenwashing is that is makes it very hard for consumers to vote for the good guys and discern green products from the semi green and the complete frauds. I can see why this would make Jeffrey very angry in trying to compete in the fog of false green. I also hate the 'natural" label that actually means nothing.

However, this does not speak to your broader point about supporting the general shift toward green and greener products. This is a good thing. It is the compound interest view of life. These things add up.

The GM broadside, a company I have zero love for, gives away the game. The investment in Volt is real. If it succeeds, it will be game changing. We should applaud that as much as condemn the heinous SUV marketing by GM. Does Jeffrey think the answer to past bad corporate behavior is to remain stuck in the past with not possibility of redemption?

I am also not sure I buy the idea that a corporation has to support evey NGO political agenda on the hill in order to avoid the charge of hypocrisy on other environmental commitments. We are in a time of necessary reregulation of financial markets, food saftey, the environment, but that doesn't mean there are not legitimate (as well as selfish/corrupt) opposing views.

I look at the Acela, the non-working fast train, that fails because our safety standards required heavier materials. We couldn't just import the trains/technology.. So now we have semi-fast, safer trains that don't run on time and break down. That's a wonderful trade off that make people want to get out of their cars and take the train to New York.

This is a good debate to have. I look forward to Jeffrey's next post.

[Tim]

I think Reid is spot on to bring up the consumer side of the issue. It may, possibly, be irrelevant what the motive are of the corporations, as long as they are producing greener products, but the motives of the consumer do matter, I think.

The whole point to the "green movement" is to live in a manner that is more sustainable and leaves a softer impact on the planet. This requires some critical self-analysis on the part of the individual to identify ways in which they can reduce their impact. However, with greenwashing, consumers by the "green" products because they have become a trend. They may not stop to think about whether buying MORE stuff is actually aiding at all in being a greener person.

It's a tricky conundrum to be sure. After all, if it means a worldwide reduction in GHG emissions, then it's hard to criticize greenwashing to heavily. But it might be worth taking a step back to stop and consider, What Is Sustainability?

[kenshin]

it's kinda sad, really, when folks who are actually on the same side, end up wasting time on details instead of using collective braintrust to find better solutions to our problems. greenwashing happens--for some companies going green is part of the raison d'etre...for others, it's an attempt to be part of a fad to keep from losing customers. those latter companies will probably have to go greener by default, as the price of oil makes us all look at our carbon output as a matter of reducing costs.

still, sophisticated consumers today will probably not wait for those companies to get a grip--we want real green, and i ain't talking money.

if you have time, i'd love your outlook on a book i recently read, gary hirshberg's book, stirring it up.