All kinds of businesses and brands are starting to use the word ‘sustainable’ in their marketing. Whether it’s a t-shirt made of ethical cotton, or an ‘eco’ car-companies are increasingly eager to show their green credentials (=certificate). On the surface, this is good news. The climate crisis is the biggest threat to our existence. So if companies are pledging to reduce their carbon footprints, surely we should be celebrating?

Well, yes and no. We absolutely want to see meaningful engagement from companies when it comes to the environment, but how can we tell the difference between real, positive commitments to change and greenwashing?



Where did greenwashing come from?

The term arose in the 1980s after American environmentalist Jay Westervelt noted how at a hotel he visited, there were signs asking guests to reuse their towels in order to “save the environment.” Westervelt saw the huge amount of wastage he had encountered throughout the rest of the hotel, where there were no obvious efforts being made towards sustainability. Instead the hotel was simply trying to reduce costs by not having to wash towels as much but were trying to market this cost-cutting method as eco-friendly behaviour.

Nowadays, greenwashing is taken to mean two main things. It can be when companies - sometimes politicians - try to hide or cover up their less-than-stellar (=alles andere als herausragend) environmental impact with a grand, public gesture towards green awareness. In an age of social media, these big PR campaigns are often criticized pretty quickly.

But the other type of greenwashing can be a bit harder to spot and is far more insidious. This is where companies and brands use words like ‘green’, ‘sustainable’, ‘eco-friendly’, or ‘vegan’ simply as a marketing ploy (=Trick). And crucially - without any accountability for their actions.



Being seen as ethical is profitabile

There’s no universally accepted definition of what terms like ‘sustainable’ actually mean. This means big brands can market an article as ‘green’, often at a marked-up price, without sticking to a clear definition of that term.

This is happening more and more because being socially conscious sells. McKinsey found that Gen Z (people born roughly between 1995 and 2010) are more likely to spend money on companies and brands that seem to be ethical. More than any other generation that came before, Generation Z is more prepared to open their wallets for a brand that promotes causes about social impacts, such as climate, LGBTQ, racial or social justice, says Sertac Yeltekin, the COO of Insitor Partners, a Singapore-based, socially focused venture capital fund.

This gives them power to shape the success or downfall of companies. They are aware that they can drive this change. Companies, therefore, have a financial interest to appear socially conscious. This has led to the similar phenomenon of ‘pinkwashing’, where businesses push their public commitment to LGBTQ+ topics, usually around Pride month (month in which people show their support for LGBTQ community) and often in the form of a rainbow logo.

Norway’s Consumer Authority ruled last year that fast fashion brand H&M was under investigation for its supposedly ethical ‘Conscious’ collection. “H&M are not being clear or specific enough in explaining how the clothes in the Conscious collection are more ‘sustainable’ than other products they sell,” concluded the deputy director Bente Øverli.

“As H&M are not giving the consumer precise information about why these clothes are labelled Conscious, we conclude that consumers are being given the impression that these products are more ‘sustainable’ than they actually are.”

Companies like H&M exploit the vagueness of green terms to both appear environmentally conscious and sell more clothes. This is a problem, because fast fashion is one of the biggest polluters on the planet, with more than £140 million worth of clothing ending up in UK landfills every year.

New York-based zero-waste campaigner Lauren Singer runs Package Free, a company which claims to have “kept hundreds of millions of pieces of trash out of landfills.” But as TikToker and YouTuber Robert Tolppi highlights, there is no evidence of how these figures come about (=entstehen). Package Free sells numerous ‘green’ products, including a three-pack of condoms in a metal tin for $9, not including delivery. There may be less plastic packaging involved, but shipping a metal tin containing just three condoms is enormously wasteful. So while online shops like Package Free may appear to be a greener option on the surface, the facts just don’t add up (=ergeben keinen Sinn).

What are the alternatives?

It can feel exhausting trying to check every eco-credentials a brand is pushing. Fortunately, there are some brilliant online tools and search engines, such as Project Cece, Ethical Made Easy and STAIY, which help do the hard work for you.

Bramley, for example, is a British skin and haircare brand with green values at the center of its operation. The company is transparent about its journey to sustainability and is innovative in its approach (=Herangehensweise). Everything Bramley sells is refillable.

Another company doing sustainability differently is Roar Gill, a biodegradable alternative to Nespresso coffee pods. As well as producing excellent coffee, the team at Roar Gill is committed not just to carbon dioxide neutrality, but to continual improvement.

It may feel overwhelming as one individual trying to make a difference, but if consumers keep putting pressure on businesses to be transparent around their practices, we will continue to head in an authentically green direction.