Research by Starcom MediaVest Group reveals the latest insights on the dynamics of attitudinal change, explains why brands who lead consumer behaviour will win their support and loyalty, and identifies the moments at which people are most receptive to green and ethical messaging.

All consumers are on a green adoption curve, albeit travelling at different speeds. Four types of consumer were identified according to what they do for the environment rather than how they think: the Advocates, the Abiders, the Disciples and the Detached.

Advocates, comprise 10% of the population and are highly motivated - the only group of people who regularly campaign, blog and boycott. They are often uncompromising in their attitudes and can be intolerant of those with less passionate views.

Abiders make up 24% of adults; they are positive without being political; they aspire to being greener and more ethical, often seeing it as a signifier of social status.

Disciples are the majority of the population at 41%. They tend to be more green than ethical and they feel that they ought to get more involved but are often not sure how to. They are happier to defer to sources of authority rather than actively seek information and are particularly in need of leadership from brands.

The Detached, 25% of the population, are more apathetic than actively anti-green, but have nevertheless formed a powerful set of barriers to adoption.

Demographically, attitudinally and in terms of media usage and participation, these consumer groups can significantly differ. For example, 28% of Advocates read blogs or take part in discussion forums compared to 9% of Abiders. This limits communication between groups, but more importantly cultural factors can restrict the trickledown of influence.

Usually we see word of mouth as more important than media as an influencer of behaviour, but with green or ethical issues the opposite is often true. Only one in six Disciples - the majority of the "involved" population - have regular conversations, and over two-thirds say the media is more influential than their friends.

The crucial point is talking about being more green or ethical is difficult for people. There can be a feeling of being overwhelmed by the gravity and complexity of the issues, and advocates are often dismissed as being too serious or worthy. The opinions of the passionate and even the advice of friends tends to spark resentment as much as a desire to change.

This means that brand communication should be weighted toward pinpointing a target audience, rather than trying to influence the influencers. An influential green and ethical opinion leader within each social group just doesn't exist.

The exaggerated influence of media on all segments can present problems for brands. People are willing to defer to expert opinion filtered through the media, which is seen as more of a neutral ally. Where the media challenges brands (as with the recent Channel 4's food fight programming), brands must be prepared to take on the recommended challenges. Simultaneously, building positive word of mouth can help brands to harness their agenda and tackle negative media coverage.

Brand leadership by example
To earn and protect consumer trust it is important that brands lead by example in affecting their customers' behaviour change. Brands are expected to take responsibility - 67% of respondents expect brands to take responsibility for promoting green and ethical purchasing, over and above government action. Only a third of respondents expect brands to be 100% green and ethical, but increasingly brands are being held responsible for making choices on behalf of their customers. Two brand initiatives that have done this - Sainsbury's decision to sell only fairtrade bananas and M&S's Plan A campaign - were cited in the study.

Brands should take a lead and contribute to solutions on green issues, share a vision and bring consumers on the journey towards it, strike partnerships and work with other bodies for mutual benefit, and finally arm consumers, in order to help them justify decisions to themselves.

Not only that, but brands should always answer the "what's in it for me?" question from consumers - brands need to show how their customers are also benefiting. The study also shows that they should not expect to borrow values from ethical media - that right must be earned in the eyes of consumers. Neither should they fake ethical grassroots as it is easy for customers to spot manufactured buzz, and messages work better in environments where people are in an active frame of mind.

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9 March 08

Next time you're in a shoe store, pick up a pair of clogs or leather walking shoes from Timberland. Inside, right by the heel, you'll find a single number that tells you how "green" the shoe is. This number is explained in a card in the shoe box that provides a 0-to-10 carbon rating. A zero means less than 2.5 kilograms of carbon and other greenhouse gases were emitted when the shoe was produced and shipped. And a 10? That's a whopping 100 kg, roughly equal to the carbon released if you drive a car 240 miles.

There's a simple premise behind the new label. Our everyday activities, whether making pancakes or jetting across the sky, are linked to the combustion of fuel, which releases gases that contribute to global warming. Timberland believes climate-conscious shoppers will buy shoes that help them cut their carbon count. And those same customers will feel more loyal to the brand because Timberland respects their wishes.

Sixty different Timberland products sport such numbers. They reflect both the "carbon footprint" of the shoes and other factors, such as the quantities of harmful chemicals used to make them. By 2010, Timberland plans to put the labels on all its shoes and clothing, and others companies are set to follow its lead. The goal, says Timberland CEO Jeffrey Swartz, is "to arm consumers with as much information as we can."

How will consumers respond?
But will shoppers really be able to interpret such information? And even if the tags catch on, will they make a difference in reducing greenhouse gases?

Experts are divided on these questions. Climate scholars point out that it's almost impossible to distill into a single number the intricacies of carbon chemistry, manufacturing processes, supply chains—and how they all affect global warming. And the very idea of doing so is controversial.

Last spring, Britain-based Tesco, the world's third-largest retailer, announced plans to make public how much carbon is released in the production, transport, and consumption of all 70,000 products on its supermarket shelves. The plan immediately drew howls of protests from manufacturers, who thought the burden of measuring emissions would land on their shoulders.

Global environmental groups declared labels a distraction from more important corporate efforts to improve energy efficiency. Shoppers, meanwhile, seemed confused by the first such tags that appeared on store shelves, except when they were part of a larger education campaign. "It requires leadership, commitment, and pressure to make something like this happen," says Edgar Blanco, a research associate at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who has studied carbon labels. "The truth is, no one knows how to educate consumers about this, or how it will work."

The skeptics certainly have a point. Yet many shoppers are eager to understand how their own activities affect the environment. In a survey last summer by AccountAbility, a nonprofit that advises corporations and governments on sustainable business practices, nearly half of 2,734 U.S. and British consumers polled said they wanted to know which products caused the least harm.

Companies have different ideas about how to present this information. Walkers, a unit of PepsiCo took an approach similar to Tesco's. Acting on its own, it put a simple label on its 35-gram bags of cheese and onion potato chips that says "75 grams of CO₂." Boots, Britain's largest pharmacy chain, took a different tack last summer. Experimenting with labels on its Botanics shampoo, it used signs in its stores to provide the explanation—much as Timberland relies on fact sheets in the shoe box.

Pioneers like Tesco and Boots understand they're in the midst of a Europewide crackdown on greenhouse gas emissions, and that if they don't act on reducing carbon, they could get slammed with punitive regulations. Since 2005 major carbon emitters such as power plants and oil refineries within the European Union have been forced to curtail greenhouse gases.

This summer a climate change bill is expected to be signed into law, making Britain the first country in the world to introduce legally binding CO₂ reduction targets. The new law, aimed at lowering Britain's emissions 20% by 2010, will extend the cap on carbon to large, non-energy-intensive businesses such as retailers, hotel chains, and banks. Retailer Marks & Spencer, for one, has an ambitious plan to become carbon-neutral and send zero waste to landfills by 2012.

Carbon labels were a logical outgrowth of the crackdown on greenhouse gases, which is also playing out in Washington and many state capitals. Timberland, for example, is pushing other shoemakers to agree on an industry standard. But companies heading down this path might learn from the challenges encountered by the pioneers.

The highest hurdle is simply obtaining an accurate carbon count on different goods, a laborious process that may initially cost $10,000 or more per item. In most countries, each manufacturer figures out for itself how to gather the data that become the number on the label. Britain is trying to hash out a national standard for measuring the greenhouse gas associated with each product and service, working with the Carbon Trust, a government-funded nonprofit. That should bring down the cost of counting carbon over time; the standard should be ready by June.

Labelling labour
Even with a standard, counting can involve mind-boggling complexity. Unilever, a top supplier of household products to Tesco, operates 260 factories in 70 countries and works with more than 10,000 subcontractors. With a supply chain like that, even labeling a line of packaged noodles is a chore. Say Unilever decides to shift production of the noodles from Poland to South Wales to save money. Because of fuel consumption and other factors, that change has a big impact on the carbon tally, even though the same recipe is used.

Unilever worries that Tesco may ask it to recalculate the carbon footprint for such products each time it moves production, which might be as often as once a week. If asked, "we couldn't do it," says Gavin Neath, Unilever's senior vice-president for global corporate responsibility. "Our supply chain is constantly changing." Tesco admits there are difficulties to work out. Says David North, Tesco's director of government affairs: "We have to bring suppliers with us on this journey. It is early days."

Once the labels are in place, companies find, it's hard to tell if consumers get the point. In a survey PepsiCo's Walkers commissioned from researchers Populus, half of the 1,000 people interviewed said they were more likely to buy a product with a carbon label. But such numbers, while well-intended, may not convey much. "What does it mean to say a bag of chips contains 75 grams of carbon?" asks Steve Howard, CEO of the Climate Group in London. "I have a PhD in environmental physics, and it doesn't mean a thing to me."

Diversions?
There's another complication in labeling products: By focusing consumers' attention on this one issue, the retailer risks undercutting other store programs that are also socially responsible. When Tesco unveiled its carbon program, as an interim step it put little airplane stickers on products that were air-freighted, to alert shoppers that more fuel was burned in transport than for goods shipped by boat or truck. CEO Leahy's announcement prompted protests from governments of developing countries, including Uganda and Kenya, which felt Tesco's plans unfairly punished producers there. "The moment consumers looked at this sticker, they would stigmatize those products," says Abraham Barno, agricultural attaché at Kenya's embassy in Britain. Tesco has promised to work with developing countries to promote their products.

Demonizing imports while favoring locally grown food is, in any case, overly simplistic, argues Hilary Benn, Britain's environment minister. Studies have shown that Britain's local produce has a large carbon footprint because of the country's heavy reliance on fertilizer. Manufacturing that fertilizer takes far more energy than what's consumed on a small African farm. And the disparity persists even when you factor in the jet fuel burned to bring the vegetables to Britain. One study estimated that a consumer boycott of air-freighted African produce would reduce Britain's total emissions by less than 0.1%. "We need to cut our huge carbon footprint, not force Africa to cut its tiny one," says Benn.

Big benefits long term
Despite the controversy surrounding labeling, and the challenges in counting the carbon, defenders, including PepsiCo, say there are big side benefits. In times of $100-per-barrel oil, most companies want to be more energy-efficient, and calculating a carbon footprint is one of the best ways to find "hot spots" where energy is wasted in the production and distribution network.

Retailers such as Tesco and Boots say they'll continue to experiment with carbon labels and reap whatever rewards they bring. Some are unexpected. Last year, Boots ran a detailed, two-month analysis on the carbon footprint of its shampoos, including the carbon emitted during both production and use of the shampoo. Boots found it could reduce the production footprint by 20% when it bottled the soap in recycled plastic and made a few other packaging and transportation tweaks. But the biggest component in the overall carbon count, Boots discovered, was the amount of hot water people used during their showers. Last summer it posted signs in 250 of its stores. If you really care about your carbon footprint, the message said, use cooler water when you wash your hair.

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Not Ready…
for Prime Time Packaging

How green are you? Do you want to be? Do your consumers and your target demographic even care whether you are green or not?

There are many packaging issues afloat in the minds of the consumer. We just came off the traditional "wrap rage" cycle that stirs everyone into a frenzy around the holidays. Be aware that it's still an issue to contend with in the minds of the consumer. Clamshells, twist ties and difficult to open packages still get mileage in the media.

Packaging has many detractors. We are getting serious scrutiny from everyone in the realm of environmental sustainability, less packaging, more environmentally friendly packaging, save the earth packaging and so on. Every week I read about a new packaging crusade that is supposed to solve our environmental woes. But I have been researching for an upcoming presentation Sustainable Packaging – From Green To Great. The lack of new packaging innovation to solve the problem is quite distressing.

 
Most of what I am seeing revolves around the same supplier using the same packaging materials. Unfortunately, a lot of it is smoke and mirrors that touts "green" but does not back it up with true sustainable documentation. There are a few good examples of innovation. In researching environmentally friendly lipstick tube examples, the results were woefully inadequate. "Cargo Plant Love Biodegradable Lipstick" was the only company I discover (with a great marketing story I might add).

So, I pose these questions to all product packaging developers. How green are you? Do you want to be? Do your consumers and your target demographic even care whether you are green or not? This is going to be one of the prime time packaging issues in 08 so you better make some serious strides in deciding what you want your product packaging to reflect.

Another key matter will be product security, integrity and product origination. (AKA - The Made in China Syndrome) Currently the Made in China tag is becoming a political hot button. One of the trends I am starting to see is a China backlash. Products made and packaged in China are coming back to the US. Some companies are using China Free on their product packaging as a marketing tool -- and it's helping sales.

People are reading labels AND scrutinizing them. What it says on that label will influence whether they buy your product or not.  I just read that cloned meat will be coming on the market in a few years. At present, the FDA won't require food makers to label that their products came from cloned animals. ICK!!  I'd want to know from the product packaging and, I believe, so would most consumers. The point being is that any high profile package or product will be looked at thoroughly by consumers. What you tell them better be the right message and true.

Watchdog groups about and they are on the lookout for your product to make a mistake.  Whether they deem you are marketing to an inappropriate market (EX: Spykes marketing liquor to children) or that your packaging isn't telling the whole truth (Ex: McDonald's and all the other fast food companies and fat content), it's sure to become newsworthy and in the worst case scenario could seriously impact your business.

Consumers are fickle. What is a hot issue today may be gone tomorrow. However, in the interim if you are not on target with the right packaging message you may alienate them or force them to buy a competitor's product because your packaging is not sending the right packaging message.

So, before you embark on any new packaging campaign in 08 understand and incorporate into your product packaging what the consumer wants to know about the product. Be sure your packaging is ready for prime time to the right consumer with the right marketing message.

Get  connected with me JoAnn Hines Packaging Diva at my website http://packagingdiva.com

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Economy begins
with Eco
Cut food waste….cut carbon emissions
Meet Liz Goodwin the woman tasked with changing habits and stopping us clogging up landfill sites

30 Dec 07

Liz Goodwin (pic right) is Britain's recycler-in-chief, the woman who, as head of WRAP (the Waste & Resources Action Programme), spends £80m of taxpayers' money a year on getting us to waste less. But forget any image you may have of an activist at the barricades: her politics are based on the fundamentals of good housekeeping that she inherited from her mother. She is mild, old-fashioned and somehow very English.

Can the decent, gentle approach work on lazy consumers and greedy producers? It is her objective to find out and, with our landfill sites groaning, she does not have long.  "If we start beating people up and saying you must do that, you must do this, you lose all that goodwill, and then you're having to badger them all the time. I would just prefer to keep it on positive footing," she says.

It is a theme we return to again and again. Where many firebrands talk of using recycling laws to save the planet, she leads us gently back to the kitchen, the Mrs Beeton of environmentalism. While most of our homes are now glutted by an excess of paper, bottles and - most of all – food, the house near Oxford is spic and span.

Cut food waste…cut carbon emissions
Where politicians promise to cut the amount of trash going to landfill sites, Goodwin has to make it happen. How? The next big thing in British recycling, she promised us, is the most traditional – food. "I've identified food waste as our number one priority," she says. "Of everything that we could do, if we could reduce food waste, that would make the biggest difference in terms of carbon. Every tonne of it saved means you avoid 4.5 tonnes of carbon. That's enormous and it's not well known."

One in three bags of shopping ends up in landfill, she says, £8 billion worth of it each year, up to £400 a household. "If you think about all the energy that's gone into producing that food, all the farming, the storage, the distribution, the preparation and then, if it's wasted, it then goes into landfill and produces methane . . . I think that weekly food waste collection has a big part to play."

With pilot schemes already going well, within two to three years she is determined to see pails of rotting food routinely collected along with the rubbish, then processed at local plants to generate electricity. She foresees a day when every town will have its own anaerobic digester.

In the meantime, some tips. Have a favourite mug to measure out your rice, she advises. Check the fridge before you go shopping, and don't be boggled by "best before" dates. "My mother would use the good old sniff test and a bit of a taste, if it tasted all right, it'll find a use," she says.

Rather than exotic recipes from Nigella Lawson, children should be taught the forgotten art of using up leftovers (needless to say, the over-65s are the most thrifty with food). It should be part of the curriculum? "Yes. We need to be able to know what to do with food, and not just get scared when we look in the fridge and think what do I do with those things?"

If you buy too big a portion, put half in the freezer."
Her favourite tip for us profligate consumers? If you buy too big a portion, put half in the freezer. "It's not rocket science," she says. "Instead of just putting it back in the fridge and two days later thinking, 'Oh, I should have used that', and having to throw it away." She continues: "If we're cooking a meal for ourselves, we [she and her partner, Bruce, an accountant and a father of three] often consciously make enough for a third plate, because it can go in the freezer and then if one of us is back late or something it's a quick meal – and it avoids the wastage in the first place." That's it? Never mind the younger generation's burning passion to make a difference by direct action.

The most effective direct action, according to Goodwin, boils down to doing stuff our mothers and grandmothers did by rote. Forget Hollywood celebrities and international politicians, our interest should lie in mucky, unglamorous scraps. Typically, she is not pushing to force shops to use less packaging. She wants to wait and see if they can manage it on their own. She talks enthusiastically about how supermarkets should offer a service to refill empty washing up bottles and so on, like they do in Australia and America. But compel them to get going on these plans? No. People, especially here in Britain, don't like to to be told what to do, she says.

Couldn't you do a bit more to beat the drum? "I'm sure there's more we can do." What if her approach means that our already lamentable progress compared to the rest of Europe continues to be slow? Well, "let's see".

What about the online retailers, such as Amazon, who have refused to sign up even to the voluntary agreement to reduce packaging? "I think it's something we ought to look at." Does she leave her packaging at the till, like some environmental activists? "I think that's fine for people who want to do it, but I don't." Why? "Because I'm not a campaigning person like that. I want to make a difference, but I want to do it in my own way. I don't need to be seen to be making headlines. I can be far more effective in actually working with the retailers."

After gaining a PhD in chemistry Goodwin worked for ICI and was alarmed at the "massive effect" the company was having on the environment. She decided that she wanted to devote her life to something more worthwhile. When, we wondered, did she last buy something wasteful? She thought long and hard. "I'm going to struggle with this one. I'm not entirely sure. It would probably be something silly like some new towels when, actually, the others are not too bad."

If all of us were as modest and conscientious as Goodwin, we'd have this recycling thing all wrapped up in a (recyclable) Jiffy. If only.

Liz Goodwin (pic right)
Education.  Chichester High School for Girls; University College London; PhD in chemical physics at Exeter University

Research career.  Worked for ICI researching alternatives to CFCs that harm the ozone layer, and later held a number of technical and production jobs

Environmental career. Worked as an environmental consultant for Zeneca. Joined Wrap in 2001 as director of the materials programmes, promoting the use of recyclables. Appointed chief executive in 2007

Watch your waste
80% The estimated increase in the amount of food wasted in Britain over the Christmas season, compared with the rest of the year

£275m Worth of food, or about 230,000 tonnes, will be thrown away over the holiday. Most of this food reaches landfill sites where it emits methane, a powerful greenhouse gas.

20% Of Britain's greenhouse gas emissions are associated with food production, distribution, disposal and storage
Source: WRAP

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Fairtrade fashion focus
UK retailers to drive ethical clothing up 50% in 2008

27 Dec 07

A small village in Mali is not usually where you expect to run into a buyer from Topshop, Marks & Spencer or Debenhams, but the landlocked African country is increasingly playing host to some of Britain's top retailers as they battle it out to prove their ethical credentials.

Demand for Fairtrade and organic cotton, much of which is grown by small producers in poor countries such as Mali, Cameroon and Burkina Faso, is expected to balloon next year as stores draw on one of the most well known ethical brands.

The labelling organisation is conservatively predicting a 50% increase in sales of Fairtrade cotton in 2008. However, sales are likely to considerably exceed that estimate as high street retailers and supermarket groups including J Sainsbury and Tesco all step up the amount of Fairtrade cotton they sell.

The new initiatives come on top of an estimated eightfold increase in sales of Fairtrade cotton this year to a retail value of £45m, up from just £6m the year before.Fairtrade cotton has been a roaring success since it was launched in 2005. It is the fastest-growing product group among six major categories of goods now sold under the ethical guarantee, including wine, confectionery and hot beverages.

In February Marks & Spencer promised to produce 20 million garments using Fairtrade cotton by the end of next year. Debenhams will also make its first major move into the market next year with the launch of FiveG, a men's clothing range.

Topshop, meanwhile, will help Fairtrade to achieve its aim of attracting a younger, trendier audience when it steps up its own-label range of items using ethically sourced cotton next year. The fashion chain will be selling underwear in 50 stores, nightwear in 73 stores and jeans and fashion pieces in the 30 top stores after a successful trial of T-shirts made with Fairtrade cotton this year.

Sainsbury's intends to increase the amount of Fairtrade cotton it uses by 50% in 2008 to 630 tonnes as part of a plan to switch all its standard T-shirts in its Tu clothing range to the ethical fibre.

A spokeswoman for Sainsbury's said: "Since we started selling Fairtrade bananas nearly seven years ago, customers have demonstrated that they now expect the values of Fairtrade to be a normal part of their shopping. There is a growing awareness among UK consumers of the importance of buying Fairtrade products to improve the livelihoods of poor producers."

Fairtrade offers farmers a higher price for the cotton than they can get on the world market, calculated to ensure that it covers production and living costs. An additional premium is also distributed to the producer cooperatives that are an essential part of the Fairtrade system. The cooperatives invest their premium in community development projects such as schools, clean water and clinics.

Under the scheme, retailers and brands must make long-term commitments regarding the amount of cotton they need to allow producers to plan production efficiently. They must also get Fairtrade approval for each step in their supply chain, from spinning to manufacture, under stringent rules. It's quite a tricky process for retailers who are trying to ensure they are as responsive as possible to shoppers' latest whims.

However, in return, producers commit to sell only their best cotton fibre to Fairtrade buyers. They are also bound by much stricter environmental care rules than conventional cotton producers.
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Al Gore's $100M+
carbon cutting campaign

Can a big ad campaign turn awareness into action?

12 Oct 07
Whether it's for national security reasons or to protect the environment, nearly everyone agrees the US should use energy more efficiently. Yet energy use is going nowhere but up. By 2030 it's expected to jump 35 to 40% in the U.S. alone.

Al Gore the former vice president, Oscar-winner and now Nobel Peace Prize recipient is embarking on a climate-change advertising campaign estimated to cost between $100-$200 million a year, one of the largest public service campaigns in history.

Expect to see television commercials, newspaper spreads and Internet ads popping up in a few months time. Funded by donations and proceeds from Gore's 2006 "An Inconvenient Truth," the campaign will focus on convincing people that they can do something about global warming.

We have the technology to cut carbon
"It's about communicating the urgency and solvability of the climate crises," said Brian Hardwick, a spokesman for the Alliance for Climate Change, an environmental group founded and chaired by Gore. "So [people] will demand the kind of change we need."

The campaign won't focus solely on energy. It will most likely also address other factors, from deforestation to methane from cows that contribute to global warming. But carbon dioxide is the main greenhouse gas, and most of the carbon dioxide emissions generated by humans come from burning fossil fuels.

The ads won't endorse any specific legislation in Congress - such as bills to raise fuel economy standards, cap carbon emissions or require utilities to buy a certain percentage of renewable power.

Rather, it will attempt to convince people that global warming is not an unstoppable phenomenon that is now out of their control. It will aim to convince people we have the technology and the ability to avoid global warming and the disasters that scientists say it will create, like crop-killing droughts, city-destroying floods.

The hope is to motivate people to pressure their political and social leaders to make the necessary policy changes. "We have all the answers we need," said Hardwick. We want to "reframe the issue as an opportunity, not a sacrifice."

The campaign will be created by the Richmond, Va.-based Martin Agency, the same outfit behind Geico's successful caveman ads and UPS' "What can brown do for you." Martin was also recently chosen as Wal-Mart's lead agency.

Make the ads personable
"It's a big purchase, people will see it," said Matt Creamer, editor-at-large at the industry journal Advertising Age, although he added that even $200 million was small compared to some big corporate campaigns, which can cost as much as $1 billion.

But can an advertising campaign actually change society? Advertising experts experts say ads can accomplish a great deal - think of the anti-tobacco campaign or the anti-drunk driving campaign - but it will take time.

The anti-smoking crusade started in the late 1960s, according to Bruce Vanden Bergh, a professor of advertising at Michigan State University. But states didn't start banning smoking in the workplace, restaurants and bars until the late 1990s. "A campaign] has the potential" to reduce energy consumption," said Vanden Bergh. "But once it starts, you've got to stay with it." The best way to convince people to use less energy, he said, is to make the ads personable. "There's a tendency to sum up with an intellectual argument, but ultimately it comes down to emotional issues," said Vanden Bergh.

Jay Newell, a professor of advertising at Iowa State University, said using a man-on-the-street ad, one that holds another person up as an example, would be better than the kind of slick advertisements that are designed to boost brand images, a-la Coke or Nike ads. "It's a bandwagon strategy," said Newell. "People look around and see what others are doing, and they do the same thing."

How small business can slow global warming
He pointed to the rationing drive during WWII, which gave people specific instructions on how to conserve. "You have to communicate exactly what to do," he said. "Give me the language I need to explain exactly why I'm not [driving over] for Thanksgiving."

It might be necessary to go after people's pride, much the way the "Don't Mess with Texas" campaign got people thinking that littering was somehow un-Texan, said Sue Alessandri, a professor at Syracuse University's Newhouse School of Public Communications. "It'll have to almost associate using energy with a character flaw, something that makes it very personal," said Alessandri.

Vanden Bergh used the smoking example: smokers were once considered the heroes, and you were a loser if you complained about someone smoking at the table next to you.

Now that dynamic is reversed. The same mentality, he said, needs to be established towards energy use.

Recent polls show 92% of the American public supports raising vehicle fuel efficiency standards, and 64% would pay a higher gas tax if the money went towards renewable fuel research, said Kateri Callahan, president of the Alliance to Save Energy.

Callahan credited the public support partly to education, outreach, and other publicity campaigns.  She said the Alliance has been trying to raise vehicle fuel efficiency standards for the last 10 years, but it was only this year that Congress is seriously considering a bill along those lines. "Now we can do it," said Callahan. "The political will is there, the constituents are there."

Editor's Comment
Congratulations to Al Gore on a remarkable year of recognition. We feel he has done a remarkable job in bringing the problem of global warming to everyone's attention.

As the UK has proven…you can cut costs and cut carbon emissions at the same time. The UK's productivity will have increased by 50% between 1990 and year 2010. Meanwhile carbon emissions will have been cut by 25%.

Now he is taking the initiative again and putting money where his mouth is. Marketing the issues is definitely the way forward.

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Eco-fashion comes of age

11 Sep 07
In 2006, the glossies couldn't get enough of fashion's Green Revolution. Finally, they proclaimed, "eco" no longer equaled "geeko." Editors at Vogue, InStyle, and The New York Times swooned over bamboo denim totes, organic cotton tees and recycled vintage sweaters. Bono's wife Ali Hewson promoted her socially-conscious Edun line, and organic pioneers like Stewart + Brown, Loomstate, Linda Loudermilk and Ecoganik bloomed like never before.