Greenwashing

by: Cherly Appleton

Nothing is more disturbing than fake environmental ethos, where marketers use specific techniques to grab their slice of the billions of dollars North Americans spend each year on natural and organic products.

Kim Severson of the New York Times suggests “buy a greenwashed product and you’re buying a specific set of healthy environmental and socially correct values.”

The actual health benefits of a product doesn’t matter only that you feel good about your decision to purchase it.

It’s doubtful that most people are fooled by the gentle image of a field or strangely oversized fruit but that doesn’t seem to stop the onslaught of “organic” advertising from spilling out past the grocery store and into the snack food aisle at the local gas station.

Now the gas station is one place you would expect to find unhealthy food. Or is it?

Krispy Kreme would have everyone believe that a newly introduced whole wheat, caramel-flavoured glaze doughnut at 180 calories is ‘healthier’ than their original glazed at 200 calories.

In the rush to market something new, (Krispy Kreme stock is struggling), someone forgot to mention the transfat content, which is a more serious issue in baked goods than 20 calories.

Greenwashing can be easily identified packaging designs with cartoon characters or goofy hand-rendered graphics. Haven’t we noticed the shifting of Blue Menu products from teal to aquamarine? Can you recall the commercial suggesting that there was no need to read the labels any longer because if you buy the stuff in the blue packages, isn’t it a comfort that they’ve taken care of this?

And who are ‘they’ anyway? Today, many of the big companies try not to look like big companies: Unilever owns Ben & Jerry’s, the Hain Celestial Group (Celestial Seasonings) is traded on NASDAQ and Tom’s of Maine is controlled by Colgate-Palmolive.

Food consumers should keep reading those labels and push companies for even more information about environmental impact. Because we’re wising up to the game!

Posted in: Health