Branding Environmental Sustainability

The growth of social media has continuously revolutionized the way and the rate by which old and new ideas are communicated. The different factors that influence how social media is able to facilitate our cultural trends can be explained by the amount of content and ideas that are shared online. For example, the recent resurfacing of a 2015 video of a turtle getting a plastic straw removed from its nostril combined with blogging about the pressures of climate emergencies caused a spiral into discussions about environmentalism on social media. Before long, the media had encouraged a large movement among younger generations to live sustainably, with an increasing number of YouTubers blogging their sustainable hauls and social media users encouraging others to purchase metal straws to prevent turtles and other animals from continuing to suffer from our mindless pollution.

The bedrock of sustainable living is conscious consumption, in which consumers invest in products of better quality that can be used for longer and are generally made without harming the environment, limiting the need to buy replacements. Conscious consumers recognize that consumption is a necessity, are mindful of unlearning the unnecessary practices of consumption, and actively work to reduce their negative footprint on the environment.

Companies and corporations have noticed this widespread interest in sustainability and environmentalism online as a potential source of profit. Many companies have rebranded themselves through greenwashing or claiming to be more green or eco-friendly than they actually are in order to drive sales and profits. This strategy sends the message that purchasing a given company’s products constitutes a personal contribution to the environment, fostering an individual sense of ethical responsibility in potential consumers.

The term “greenwashing” was coined in 1986 by Jay Westerveld in an essay in response to the irony of the “save the towels” movement in hotels. As hotels urged visitors to reuse towels in order to save water, Westerveld saw that they wasted resources in different ways, while chiding the public for their own faults. The game, of course, was that hotels had a profit incentive to promote the movement: not washing linen as often would save money.

Westerved’s essay was published a year after Chevron’s People Do campaign. In the mid-1980s, Chevron commissioned this campaign, which was used to broadcast its environmental dedication. In reality, it was violating the Clean Air Act and the Clean Water Act, as well as spilling oil into wildlife refuges. From toxic air emissions at their facilities to 890 violations of waste-water pollution laws leading up to the campaign, Chevron tried to avoid the backfiring of this campaign by paying the EPA millions of dollars in fines, painting a rosy picture of its dedication to ecological good deeds.

While Chevron was one of many companies to participate in greenwashing early on, a general increased accessibility and circulation of information, primarily through the Internet, means that greenwashing has also evolved as a marketing technique. As the term became popularized, greenwashing has taken many forms, from the use of non-government regulated words such as “biodegradable,” “organic,” and “eco-friendly” to the claim of creating products that will aid the environment in some way—this is while using production methods that directly do the opposite. A corporation might produce efficient light bulbs in factories that pollute rivers. The difference between the earlier act of greenwashing and more evolved acts of greenwashing is that companies have become increasingly aware and precise in the way they market eco-friendliness by flipping the role of ethical responsibility onto the consumers. Now, it is the consumer who seemingly holds the burden of being environmentally conscious instead of the company itself, a burden that is somehow alleviated by consuming more.

The retailer H&M is a modern example. While ethical clothing brands like Reformation exist and do execute their environmental promises, sustainable clothing is hard to come by at an inexpensive price; this makes sustainability difficult to commit to. Because of this, H&M’s Conscious sustainable clothing collection offers shoppers with cheaper options for consumers with good intent. With the launch of this collection, H&M even pledged to be 100 percent “climate positive” by 2040 by exclusively using renewable energy and increasing energy efficiency in its operations. While 2040 is still a long way off, affordable pricing and an eco-friendly message compelled shoppers to be quick to buy into the hype. This was especially since H&M has already taken positive steps in alleviating their burden on the environment by being a member of the Better Cotton Initiative and offering a recycling program.

Upon closer scrutiny, however, it becomes clear that Conscious is a mere feel-good name that stands in stark contrast to H&M’s entire business model of unsustainable fast-fashion. Fast-fashion requires quick replacement and is designed to fulfill a culture of impatience. By using hazardous chemicals, solvent-based glues, and cheap materials to produce temporarily trendy clothing, H&M ensures that consumers are much more likely to purchase from H&M again in a short amount of time.

The fatalism behind many modern attempts at sustainability is a reminder that companies and consumers need to explicate their roles in the process of creating a sustainable economy. Corporations must hold themselves to standards of transparency and business methods that avoid greenwashing, and consumers must also take responsibility for keeping those corporations accountable.

The first way companies can achieve transparency and build credibility for their environmental initiatives is to disclose their annual carbon footprint. The Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) is a non-profit that plays a huge part in promoting corporate environmental responsibility, with over 7,000 companies releasing their greenhouse gas emissions numbers to CDP. The information companies provide is evaluated, and their performance is scored and released to the public each year. Since big investors look at this information to gain insight into the practices that companies are using to manage and reduce their environmental impacts, companies are motivated to adopt more sustainable methods of production in order to seem more appealing to both investors and consumers.

Amazon has received a score of “F” from the CDP for multiple consecutive years due to its unwillingness to disclose any carbon reports and answer any questions about its emissions. However, Jeff Bezos, Amazon’s CEO, has promised to measure its 2019 carbon footprint and release a carbon report by the end of the year. The problem with this recent commitment is that the decision was not a result of pressure from investors or consumers, but rather from its own employees. As consumers, we may feel largely at the whim of distractions. Even though Amazon’s overwhelmingly popular free two-day shipping option is presumably not sustainable, consumers have never raised it as a concern. This highlights the need for responsibilities to be fulfilled on the consumer end of the economy as well. Consumers must demand that companies find ways to provide products and services with minimal environmental impact, or else companies will not break out of their current injurious habits.

It’s not that we all have to stop consuming, but that we have to acknowledge our individual responsibility to consume ethically and sustainably. This means being conscious of the role we play in the profits of green capitalism and reforming how the system is sold to us. Consumers have power, and with it comes a responsibility to use it for good.