greenwashing

what is it, background, what to look out for

 
 

what is it

From a gather of definitions, greenwashing is the practice of making an unsubstantiated or misleading claim about the environmental benefits of a product, service, technology or company practice. Simply put, greenwashing can make a company appear to be more environmentally friendly than it really is.

“Greenwashing means that a company puts forward what they deem to be a positive public relations move without actually changing things for the environment. Companies greenwash to pretend they’re addressing an issue, while in reality, they’re just looking to silence environmental critics.”
— Perry Wheeler, a spokesperson for Greenpeace USA
 
 

taking a step back

The term greenwashing derived from the term whitewashing. Whitewashing (by Oxford definition) is deliberately attempt to conceal unpleasant or incriminating facts about (someone or something). Greenwashing is taking this same concept in business and adding it to the environmentally-friendly business side.

By any means, this is not a new term. The term coined around the mid-1980’s, yet it’s until the 2010’s when the term started to become a bit more prevalent. Studies came out from Harvard Business Review: Avoiding Greenwash and it’s Behaviors, Columbia Business: The Drivers of Greenwashing and National Institute of Health: Do you know what you’re buying on “buyers beware” type of mechanics.

Bottom line, there’s a lot more of this happening than we know. Especially now, in 2021, sustainability is hot, hot, hot in the consumer and business world. The term can be thrown around easily and used a bit too loosely. The good thing is, consumers are becoming more conscious on what they are buying and who they are buying from. Real estate firm, JLL, did a brief article from their studies on how Millennials and Gen-Z’ers are demanding action to have sustainability on the corporate agenda especially in a sense to attract and retain talent - “Last year around 70% of millennials said they prefer to work in a company with a strong sustainability agenda, according to a Fast Company survey. And about three-quarters of them are even willing to take a smaller salary to work for an environmentally-responsible firm.” This action has also been rubbing off in other industries like fashion (also known as Fast-Fashion), beauty/cosmetics, hotels & travel. More on Hotels & Travel here from JLL’s article, How hotels are upgrading their sustainability efforts.

In today’s day and age of information, this gives a good advantage. Although there is a massive amount of misinformation as well. Whilst it’s great to have brands want to engage and say they are environmentally friendly, they also need to be walking the talk or shall we say practice what they are preaching and/or advertising. We’ll leave it here with George Serafeim, from Harvard Business Review’s Sustainability column: Social-Impact Efforts That Create Real Value - “They must be woven into your strategy and differentiate your company”.

 
 

what to look out for

Eco-friendly. Green. All Natural. Environmentally-friendly. Non-toxic. Earth Friendly are some classic greenwashing buzzwords. Seals that also have a green check or recycling label are also types of labels to look out for. ZeroWasteCalifornia.org did a brief overview on some of the labels, check them out here. Just because there’s wording on the packaging, does not entirely mean they are holding true to the advertisement.

 
 

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