FTC To Scrutinize Greenwashing
Does anyone else find it ironic that our government is planning to scrutinize marketers for making false Green marketing claims? Is this the same organization that has been trying to market Global Warming as a hoax? Regardless of which theory you believe, the FTC is planning to update their “Green Guides,” guidelines to help marketers avoid over-bending any laws, which are now almost a decade out of date old.
According to this Business Week article, they plan to pay special attention to carbon offsets. These are environmentally positive activities that are used in conjunction with environmentally negative activities in an effort to claim that a product or service is “carbon neutral.” For example, a company selling pesticides may, in turn, plant trees and recycle and so on. It’s sort of like eating a Snickers bar with a Diet Coke. You can drink all the Diet Coke you want but it won’t take away the fat and calories in that candy bar. It doesn’t work that way. It is easy to see how these claims can get out of hand.
Marketers are often accused of spinning and distorting the truth to sell products and create artificial demand. Lawyers are accused of the same thing and they’re universally despised for it. (They obviously need better marketing.) For us, it makes sense to pay attention to this FTC investigation. We’re better off keeping our act clean, while we proudly highlight the clean acts of our clients.
Image courtesy of this guy.
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