You're too ecomotional

Researchers worldwide have consistently set out to understand the impact of doing business on our world. Does anyone know the cost of having an environmental conscience? Or more importantly what is the opportunity cost of a green mind? Big questions, no debate, but are the business world asking them? Or have we fallen prey to our fetish for fads? Whipped up into a frenzy of self-preservation we gave in to our ecomotional state, we sold out our survival, our greenness became a fad and one can appreciate the sarcasm inherent in the question, "Is Green the new Black?" I find it hard to believe that no one thought to address these questions. It fact I'm sure someone did, but did questioning in this ecomotional state, questioning the validity around how to be more sustainably green, were we scared to be painted with a environmental scarlet letter, and so the ecomotional state continued.

Marketers are to blame. “Green sells baby, green sells.” It has arrived; a new competitive differentiator, a new widget, a new angle, a new spin, a new story to break. While the truth of the matter is what is breaking is the sustainability of sustainability. Green is in its infancy, people are still learning but so long as we treat ‘Going Green' as ‘The next best thing' and continue to dress it in campaigns, we can be rest assured it, along with the environment it is trying to save, will fall by the wayside. The media will move on, other issues will be more topical and Green will find itself picnicking in park alongside its friends from CSR. If you'll excuse the metaphor, we need to grow sustainability from the grassroots up, not paint it on billboards.

Many business leaders and consumers alike are portraying a common defence, believing that green issues don't affect hem or if they ignore them they will go away. Green issues are here to stay, long after we have gone. Its time we gave sustainability to the Sustainability debate. People; Planet; Profit. We've all heard about it, our European and American colleagues even practice it, sometimes. But who is measuring it, whom is accountable for it? Marketing should understand this problem scenario and pioneer it within the business, aligning all processes and departments to deliver on real sustainable change. How many companies are actively developing a brand greenprint? A translation or formulation of a businesses aligned green efforts. Has anyone asked whether a brand green print would result in a print run of more greenbacks? What you don't measure you won't treasure, an old adage, not an “inconvenient truth” but a consistent reality.

Why bother with yet another initiative I hear you asking. The issue of conducting business in a manner that is environmentally sustainable affects us all from brand propagator to brand consumer. This is perfectly logical. However, when trying to understand the sustainability of encouraging environmentally friendly behaviour we need to understand its relevance to both parties.

Frankly, humanity needs to be guarded from itself, and by itself. The average consumer does not concern himself with sustainability beyond his lifespan. Not unless they have an intellectual understanding and emotional commitment to subsequent generations - an ecomotive, to act responsibly. The source of ecomotives is education. Although relatively speaking the statistics illustrating the number of Business schools offering Environmental sustainability centred programmes, remains low, a report from Net Impact, indicates the number of CSR jobs that are publicly advertised has gone up by 37 percent since 2004. This reflects a genuine need in the market for managers and senior executives knowledgeable about the environment, who can lead green initiatives and create new profit centres. Is this industry reacting to a fad or building its sustainability in a necessary field of credibility. Below is a table taken from the Aspen Institutes Centre for Business Education, Beyond Grey Pinstripes 2007-2008 survey. This survey examines innovative full-time MBA programs leading the way in the integration of issues concerning social and environmental stewardship into the curriculum. We all know an individual's disposition to anything starts with awareness. As education around being ecocentric rises, so does our consumer's disposition. With an aware audience, can we afford to play dumb?

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A brand blue print has traditionally outlined a brands vision and mission, its reason for being. It has then outlined how to behave to substantiate this reason for being and perhaps sometimes alluded to it reasoning for acting this way. An attempt to specify, measure and treasure a relatively “soft” discipline. To be clear the only reason it's seen as soft is because Marketing needs to move past pretty pictures and semantics and show results. Marketing needs to overcome the tendency to stop at the 'what' and start giving the 'so what'. A brand 'greenprint' would need to do the same, environmentally speaking.

One study announces that the LOHAS( Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability) market, now claims more than US$209 billion in annual sales revenue in the US. While another claims that “despite conversations about eco-overload, sustainability is in a nascent stage, especially in the minds of consumers” (2008 Image Power Green brands survey - Landor). Conflicting evidence to say the least. This conflict arises owing to a lack of specific and measurable criteria, all of which influence the true impact on both our understanding of what it means to be green as well as what it means to want to purchase green. We need to translate our business objectives into a platform that is more relevant to our everyday consumers. Relevance around environmental concerns will only be sustainable through consistent education, and communication from government, corporations and NGO's. This consistent education and communication needs to be understood by our marketers. It starts within the company. Consumers think of now, most people don't plan for their retirement how do we expect for them to plan for the children's futures? Without a translation of the now into behaviour and consequence, half your target market has moved on to the next selfish indulgence. If it is not a self-indulgence it is a transference of priority. Right now the worlds economy has slowed dramatically in growth. With the “r” word being whispered in corridors, the relevance of long-term sustainability just took a back seat to short term survival. According to research, presented by executives from WPP (NASDAQ: WPPGY) agencies Landor Associates, Cohn & Wolfe, and Penn, Schoen & Berland Associates (PSB) at Sustainable Brands 08, although the top ten list of environmentally friendly brands exists, the concern and importance around environment has taken a back seat to the economy for more than 75 percent of Americans and 66 percent of Britons.

U.S.	U.K.
1. Whole Foods	1. Body Shop
2. Burt's Bees	2. Marks & Spencer
3. Trader Joe's	3. Waitrose
4. Tom's of Maine	4. Tesco and Sainsbury (tied)
5. Toyota	5. Asda
6. Seventh Generation	6. Dove and Google (tied)
7. Honda and GE (tied)	7. The Co-operative Bank
8. Whirlpool	8. E.ON
9 Aveda	9. Morrisons
10. Method	10. Nivea and Toyota (tied)

“In 2008, the top brands in the US were the ones that you put on or in your body, and in the UK the places where you buy those type of products,” said Scott Siff, Executive Vice President at Penn, Schoen & Berland. “Despite consumers' high interest in cutting energy consumption, the brands with real potential to reduce energy usage, though high in the green rankings, could still do a better job of connecting to people's energy-saving impulses more directly, more personally. Doing that would take those brands' green-ness to the next level of consumer relevance.”

It is only through a strategically considered and interpreted brand greenprint that we will be able to increase our relevance to consumers while clearly differentiating ourselves from our competition and other “more important” short term concerns. Our communication around our Sustainability programmes should not be seen as promotional tools, for fear of falling prey to the threat of ‘Going Green' being practised as just another fad.. We need to make over our processes not make up for them - Businesses need to crack the surface of the green initiative. It is not a once off campaign to appease stakeholders and gain quick wins. It is a strategic (and for the vast majority), a dramatically different way of conducting business. General Electric's CEO, Jeffery Immelt knew this, his board didn't. Immelt was quick to identify in 2004 that GE's environmental initiatives were not being conducted efficiently. He intuitively created an initiative within the business with the mandate to create a single strategic plan, an “Eco Scorecard”. His insights were gleamed from interviews with GE's top customers, input from an internally appointed team on greenhouse legislation as well as having employed the services of an environmental consultant to help create and audit green scorecards. Immelt knew that the success of his initiative was in its plan for implementation and its ability to be measured. While we need to avoid the tendency to promotionalise our ‘good deeds', this does not mean we should remain mum. GE's “eco-scorecard” focused around long term goals such as growing its spending on clean tech R&D to $1.5 billion in 2010, reducing its absolute greenhouse gas emissions by 1% before 2012, and generating $20 billion in revenue from green products. GE was not spending money on “greenwashing” campaigns, but rather investing in real change within the business, ensuring increased relevance and credibility in the eyes of its consumers.

Tangibly the strategic “eco scorecard” resulted in a marketable campaign. GE created a sub brand known as Ecomagination. This brand was marketed and applied to all Environmental sustainable initiatives, harnessing a single message, a message that was relevant, owneable and distinct. Upon presentation of Ecomagination to the top 35 executives within GE, the plan received a pessimistically solid no, According to Immelt “most of the executives argued the approach would cost too much and it would be undermined by GE's many superfund sites”. Immelt went ahead anyway. The results speak for themselves: According to Greenorder (The environmental consultant employed), GE is on track to reach its long term environmental goals. The value of the GE brand has grown 16.9%, to $51.6 billion, according to brand consultancy Interbrand. Immelt himself estimates shareholders have benefited about 5c, to 10c per share as of 2008. Having identified GE's brand greenprint, having actioned it as rationally as possible providing built ecomotives for consumers and having avoided ecomotional panic, GE benefited its bottom line, its double bottom line and its triple bottom line.

CSR started as a fad, it is still struggling to cement itself alongside Marketing and Human Resources. Yet, this little band of softer issues has been proved time and time again to be a valuable investment centre for big business. Green issues has now joined the merry men, as their Robin Hood. Business science and business sense demands measurability and accountability. Until we specify, track and measure these outlaws there will be no robbing from the rich and giving to the poor. Society will continue to hunger after an individualistic greed, a short-term survival instinct, until we realise the relevance of green and its merry men, until we realise that we can all benefit as a society. Green sustainability's credibility as a discipline will only be granted and acknowledged through hard tangible figures of profit. When a brand greenprint results in a print run of more greenbacks. After all, business is about profit. Profitable people, profitable planet(s) and profitable profit.