Sustainable Business Practices-Talking With Tom Osdoba

I would have posted this earlier but Ive been dead sick all weekend.

Anyway, Tom Osdoba , the director of the center for sustainable business practices at the UO, came and spoke to my green branding class last Wednesday, it was nothing short of inspirational.

After we hashed out some definitions of sustainability, he began to outline what a sustainable economy looks like. A sustainable (or alternatively conservation) economy is equally balenced on all sides by social capital, natural capital and economic capital. It uses all these capital resources wisely and gives back to all of them at the same time.

He also explained that we need to approach our environmental problems with humility and realize that we are not going to be able to "fix" every problem we created. Instead we need to start acting like the "native species" that we are. he further emphasized that how we are living currently is "incongruous with being native."

Tom then began to show us how the biggest challenges to sustainability are institutional. He emphasized how, if businesses started thinking long term, sustainable practices become more than cost effective, they become profitable.  Tom also emphasized that change doesn't some about easily and it needs 3 major steps before someone (or more importantly, some business) will take action: concern + best practice+ institutional capacity= action.

I found Tom's speech inspiring on two levels.

One it showed in concrete ways how business and economic powers are the ones that have the ability to change things for the better. This is similar to what Adam Werbach talks about in "Strategy for Sustainability" and it begins to show me that maybe through business and economics (and of course advertising) we can begin to make some of the positive changes we so desperately need.

And two, it touched on ways to effective communicate to people about sustainability issues. Tom talked about getting residents of Vancouver to ride their bikes one day out of the week and instead of framing this as a sacrifice (which of course riding a bike never is) he used value messages to compel them. The key values he emphasized were: quality of life, natural environment, more time with family and friends. I believe this is important because we need to stop telling people to "make sacrifices" for the good of the environment and show them how living sustainably drastically improves your quality of life.

This is the message we need to drive home with all of our communications about being "green".

Ogilvy Earth: Green Branding or Green Washing? PT.3

My conclusion about Ogilvy Earth: Are they a true, transperant, thoughtleading green brand agency or run-of-the-mill-being-green-for-better-PR green washing extroidinars? Well neither and a little of both at the same time. While I would never call Ogilvy Earth "sustainable thought leaders" I do think that they are on their way to becoming a decent green branding agency.

They need to pick up some tougher clients, ones that would surprise me with a reinvented sustainable ground work. They should tackle someone tougher, how about Kraft,  Frito-Lay, Johnson and Johnson or Crest? Ogilvy Earth is in a position to take on big non-green clients that small agencies would never be able to touch. They need to work on not just making brands look "more sustainable" but changing the way brands do business to make their practices sustainable.    

Ogilvy Earth also needs to work on becoming more transparent and relevant to the audience that will be the most critical of its green agency claims, gen-y college students and young professionals. They need to steer away from the business jargon and explain, in layman's terms, the tactics they are using  and how they are effective. I know when I see a buzz-word packed proclamation about how great their "Eco Audits" are, I immediately tune out and suspect them for trying to hide behind their sweet-sounding but little meaning words.

But they are doing some good things, and with the power (and $$$) that Ogilvy has, they are in a position to pave the way for other monolith agencies. So here's to you Ogilvy Earth for trying. I am sure to clients trying to "go green" you seem like a good choice but if you want to be believable to us, your audience, you need to take it to the next level.

Ogilvy Earth: Green Branding or Green Washing? PT.2

On to part 2 of my Ogilvy Earth examination. Although looking at their clients gave me some good insight into how Ogilvy Earth is operating, I think that its even more important to examine their tactics. Their tactics or "capabilities" as they refer to them are listed on the Ogilvy Earth site here.

They consist of an Eco Audit, Landscape Audit, The Lab, Earth-View Software, the Three Pillars Employee Survey and IQ Mapping. I would like to take a deeper look and see what all these fancy words really mean and delve further into Ogilvy Earth to answer my question of "Green branding or green washing?"

Eco Audit:  "Collects, analyzes and synthesizes perspectives on sustainability goals, possibilities and realities, according to key stakeholders within the participating brand."

They do this by conducting interviews that (hopefully) "leads to key insights and ideas that already exist in a company’s operations and culture."

Well I guess interviews are a good start and a good way to get a feeling for how the company already thinks. I dont really see how this audit is "eco" other than it gives Ogilvy Earth an idea of what the company thinks about "sustainability." But how effective is this if the "key stakeholders" don't know jack shit about sustainability? How does Ogilvy Earth tell them that their goals are misguided if they are?

Landscape Audit: "By analyzing both online and offline news, information and cultural cues, we create a snapshot of sustainability as it relates to a particular industry or niche."

So this one seems pretty similar to the Eco Audit,  but I don't really understand how this is effective for green branding. What if the "snapshot of sustainability" shows them that no one in that particular industry is addressing "sustainability?"  What then? And aren't we really talking about reinvention to make your brand more sustainable. Who cares what your competitors or journalists are saying about "sustainabilty in your industry" I think this one is misguided because brands need to focus inward to be sustainable and not get their ideas of "sustainability" from others in their industry or journalists. How about scinetists instead?

The Lab: this one sounds creepy and awesome but what is The Lab? Ogivly Earth's website says "A living library of the world’s greatest thinkers on sustainability. Full-day Lab immersions include client and agency access to members of the Lab for workshops focused on defining a sustainability vision, a messaging platform, new product development, potential partnerships, packaging ideas and more."

this one sounds cool and in-line with green branding. Education of clients is vital in this process if they really want to reinvent their brand and "sustainablize" it. I would, however, like to see who are Ogilvy's "greatest thinkers on sustainability" though. A little more transperancy on this one would be good.

Earth-View software: "State-of-the-art technology offering a radar-style map that allows users to self-assess their current position in sustainability, for a visual presentation of a gap analysis."

that description is just too damned filled with agency jargon for me to make out what this really is. I  assume its a visual representation of the Landscape Audit-showing where the client is in relation to other brands in term of sustainability. If that is the case, I have the same criticisms for this as the Landscape Audit, but I bet it looks really cool.

Three Pillars Survey: "A sophisticated tool used to engage the organization’s employees around the economic, social and environmental actions and reputation of a business."

This capability also seems to be on the right track by identifying how the employees of the client view them. Again a good starting point to reinvent a brand and a way for the "suits" to find out about how their employees think. I do question how honest and unbiased this is though. I mean I wouldn't bad mouth the company that pays my bills too much. Again, what if the employees of said company dont know anything about sustainability and environmental issues? I think this needs to be paired with some employee education to be effective.

IQ Mapping: "A technique with both quantitative and qualitative benefits that helps identify key influencers who can make or break a client’s entry into the sustainability conversation particular to a brand’s category or industry."

Basically introducing a client to the thought leaders in their industry. Cool.  But this sounds a bit like PR spinning to me. I think a client's "make or break into the sustainability conversation" depends more on their business practices (and how sustainable they actually are) then who they know in the industry.

With this I've finished my examination of Ogilvy Earth and I feel I have a pretty good idea of where they stand as a green branding agency. I may have been a bit harsh in my criticism but standing up to harsh criticism is what a client (an agency) has to do if they want to make it in the "sustainable" business world.

See part 3 for my final conclusions!

Ogilvy Earth: Green branding or Green washing? PT.1

I love to see large multi-national advertising agencies getting involved in green branding. I really do. But sometimes I am skeptical of their intentions. Are they just hopping on the green wagon or are they really trying to change things for the better. In order to answer my question, I decided to look at OgilvyEarth and examine their green branding strategies.

First I looked at their clients:

Environmental Defense Fund: OgilvyEarth did a campaign to help raise awareness about the correlation between driving and global warming. They promoted the idea of "ride don't Drive" with inflating polar bears placed around new york. A pretty cool guerrilla marketing idea but did it really promote sustainability? They also ran PSAs that directed people to the Environmental Defense Fund's website fightglobalwarming.com.

I think that this campaign was too easy and doesn't show that OgilvyEarth are really thought leaders. It is grossly unoriginal (oh Polar bears and global warming, that's never been done before) and it was preaching to the choir a bit. Although it did win a bunch of rewards, did it really cut down on driving?

Qantas Air: A little bit more challenging company to "green up". OgilvyEarth instituted a "be green" sustainability program that helped Qantas employees to take "localized action" on environmental issues they found pressing.  This campaign was interesting because it focused mostly on Qantas Air employees "greening" up to meet "reduction targets" to help reduce Qantas' environmental impact. This is a kinda cool approach and hopefully encouraged employees to green up their own lives outside of work.

Tetra Pak: Another client that seems a bit too easy. OgilvyEarth ran a campaign to educate TetraPak's audience on how their product is "more Sustainable" than other packaging companies. Yes Tetra Pak is better for the environment, and arguably a good green product, but this campaign begs the question, "can any packaging company call themselves sustainable?" Are consumers of Tetra Pak really doing something "something positive for the planet?" or just something less negative?

Du pont: Alright, cool OgilvyEarth I am with you taking on this one. Du Pont was already doing "sustainable" building practices though, and they were already working in Greensburg befor Ogilvy stepped in. Ogilvy brought much needed awareness to Du Pont but again, this client is too easy.

In summary, I think that while OgilvyEarth has done some good things for already "green" clients, what it really needs to do is to take on clients that aren't already "green". It has the power as a large agency to step in and start changing how companies do business to better address environmental issues. I wont know where OgilvyEarth's intentions lie, whether they are in the business of making Ogilvy look good or whether they are passionately trying to chnage things for the better, until they start taking some risks and changing how some not so environmentally friendly companies do business.

I will continue this examination in PT.2 with a look at OgilvyEarth's tactics.

An interesting trend.

I just saw this article linked over at bikeportland.org and thought it was an interesting trend that could effect the future of green branding.

This article basically says that more cars were scraped last year than purchased (thus shrinking the number of US cars by 4 million) and it explains some of the trends that may have caused this. I

So the question, from a branding perspective is, How do you deal with statistics like this if your client is a car company? How does a car company stay afloat when there is less demand for cars and more competition from other car companies and transportation alternatives, like bikes? How do you appeal to younger people who are losing interest in cars and would rather ride their sweet fixed-gears than drive? Is it high time for the automakers' herd to be thinned (ohh sorry Chrysler and GM )?

I don't have the answers to these problems (yet!), but I think these are interesting and necessary questions to ask as the US' love affair with cars begins to head south.

Small things to go Green

With all the talking we've done about Green branding and trends, I wanted to post something a little more relevant to people's daily lives. I would like to share some little things that I do to reduce my impact on the environment and support green businesses. I am by far not the Greenest person in the world but I think that I do fairly well for my lack of resources, being a super broke college student and all.
1. Ride a bike: I think bikes are awesome.

They are easily accessible and are a great  way to reduce your impact on the environment,  get to know your community better, meet great people and stay in shape. I do about 90% of my errands on my bike and use it as my primary means of transportation. I do own a car and drive it as well, but if I have to get anywhere within 15 miles or so its on the trusty two-wheeled steed.

2. Eat local food: Eating local produce and locally produced food is a great way to support your local economy/community and reduce your carbon footprint.

Its even better if you live in a wonderously eco-conscious place like eugene because most of the locally produced food here is Organic. We also have some great locally produced beer so I can cover that base easily. I feel like the "buy local" movement is a great thing and I believe that we will see it gaining ground in the next few years.

3. Eat more plants: As you can see, I think what you eat (and buy) is a key environmental issue.

I am a vegetarian because producing meat is a wasteful drain of natural resources and terribly inefficient. The more plant based foods you eat the smaller your impact. Now being vegetarian is easier than ever as more and more companies are producing vegetarian alternatives that are cheap and easy.

4. Buy things from companies you agree with: Voting with you dollar is a great way to help change things for the better.

I try and buy things from companies and businesses that i agree with, ones that support community and are conscious of their environmental impact. To go along with this, I also try and buy things used whenever possible or make things I need myself. New products use new resources and are not usually necessary. The more we support good companies the more good companies there will be.

5. Re-use and recycle: I know that these are cliches nowadays but seriously they are still great ways to help conserve resources.

I see current trends that are furthering this mindset like reusable water bottles and people buying more durable goods both things that I try and do also.

This is by far not a complete list but i didn't want to ramble on. I am not big on making huge sacrifices to help the environment as I don't think this is a way to change things. The things Ive chosen don't take away from ones quality of life, they make life more interesting if anything. I also believe that change will come about from people's lifestyle and buying choices and here is where these things become relevent to advertising and "green" branding.

How Green is the Toyota Prius?

I should first preface this article with my views on hybrids so you see where I am coming from. I think they are dangerous, expensive, and by far not the "greenest" vehicles you can drive. Their silent engine is hazardous for pedestrians and cyclists (I know a few people that have been hit by Priuses while cycling). They cost more than $20,000, cheap for a car but equal to the cost of about 20 bikes or 4 used Honda civics and their environmental impact is questioned. I found a few articles about the environmental impact of the Prius, here and here. These articles question the life cycle of the Prius and the toxicity of its batteries. Although some of the research is questioned it gets one thinking about Toyota's transparency and begs the question, "how green is Toyota as a company?" As brands making green claims should be green across their company.

If we look at the Prius with the "green" guage that most people look at (MPG) than the Prius looks great with an EPA MPG rating of 52 city 45 Hwy. However if we look at some of Toyota's other cars we can see that this is not the case. Toyota also produces the Tundra (15/19 MPG), The Land Cruiser (13/18 MPG), Sienna (17/23 MPG), and FJ Cruiser (17/22 MPG). Not exactly the most environmentally friendly fleet if you ask me.

Perhaps the car company that should be touting their "greeness" is not Toyota, but Volkswagon.

A Jetta TDI (at about the same price point) gets an MPG of 30 city 41 HWY, can be run on clean-burning petroleum-free Biodiesel (even regular diesel is pretty damn clean these days with the newer ultra-low sulfur diesel required in the US) and will run for upwards of 300,000 miles (diesel engines are very durable). Volkswagon also fares better in the whole company MPG game. Their least fuel efficient vehicle the Touareg gets 14/20 but most of their vehicles average in the high 20s with their TDIs all in the 30/42 range. I can see why Volkswagon doesn't want to jump in on the US Hybrid dominated "green" car market with all the hype the Prius has here. Than again maybe they are just waiting to get on the green bandwagon when they release the L1, perhaps the greenest car ever produced.

My band on the other hand by band, Fueled By Oppression, has quite a different opinion about the Prius. Just take a listen to our song End All Be All (shameless plug).

DIY is on the rise

The TED talk we watched in class http://www.ted.com/talks/john_gerzema_the_post_crisis_consumer.html
got me thinking about good things that resulted from our current recession. One thing that interested me was the return of the DIY (do it yourself) movement. The current DIY movement really started in the 80s during our last really big recession and was mostly an underground anti-consumerism movement closely associated with the Punk Rock and underground music scenes.

Today the DIY movement has evolved to the point where it is almost a mainstream past-time with websites like Insturctables and publications like Make Magazine providing DIY insturctions to make everything from portable hard drives, to bike racks, to recycled shopping bags (and pretty much anything else that could be useful and cobbled together from a trip to Home Depot).

So what does this have to do with green branding? a lot. I think that this trend shows how people can use their creativity, ingenuity and the internet community to avoid making purchases of things that they dont really need. People are starting to realize that they dont neccesarily need a company to make everything for them, that they can make things themselves and save resources in the process. I feel that the rise of DIY is due in part to people wanting to save money but also due to people being more aware about resource depletion and how many resources go into pre-packaged products.

Green Brands can capitalize on recognizing the reasons this movement is becoming more popular. They should start paying more attention to how their products get from their warehouses to the stores and address whether their products are actually needed or if there are DIY alternatives to the things they are selling.

I just thought that creating campaigns for brands that address DIYers may be an innovative way to talk to people about stuff that matters to them. Waddaya think?

Cradle to Cradle

To go along with the TED talk we watched in class today I wanted to highlight another thought leader, William McDonough, that was a co-author of the book Cradle to Cradle http://www.mcdonough.com/cradle_to_cradle.htm. The book itself is McDonough putting his money where his highfalutin mouth is. It is made of a polymer and is 100% recyclable (and waterproof to boot.) He is another thought leader, this time a designer, who believes that there is an economic and design solution to many of today's problems.

Here's the link to his TED talk (sorry but the video wouldn't embed). Its a little bit lengthy but I think you'll find it entertaining and pertinent to some of the discussions we've had in class.
http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/william_mcdonough_on_cradle_to_cradle_design.html
This TED talk was first shown to me by John Park in his ARTD252 class and it was one of the first design/architectural/economic solutions to some of our contemporary problems that I felt had legs. Enjoy.

Adam Werbach knows whats up.

After reading the Birth of Blue Speech, I am stoked again to be in this industry. Adam Werbach, calls it like it is. I have always thought that an economic and capital change is what our country really needs. It allows us to escape the bureaucratic quagmire that is our political system and puts power where it should be, with consumers and their wallets. I guess I should have prefaced this by explaining that I am a capitalist through and through. I feel that, however flawed it may be, our economic system has done way more good than harm and it can be used as a tool to make the world a better place.

I was stoked to find out that Adam Werbach worked with Paul Hawkin on his Wal-Mart project. I read Paul Hawkins book "Natural Capitalism" http://www.natcap.org/ about four years ago and it played a big part in shaping my view that ecological improvement can be achieved through a re-tooled economic system. I may have never chose Advertising as a major and career if it wasn't for me reading Paul Hawkin's work and it excites me that our industry is building on his ideas.

Another Werbach idea I thought was cool was the PSP. It goes along with the idea of the environmental movement that little changes can make a big difference and that setting small achievable goals (and achieving them) can make you a happier and better person. SO I think we should all make our own PSP for them term and try to stick with it. I'll start.

My PSP is to be a stricter vegetarian. I've been Vegi for about 6 years now but have slacked off within the last year or so and have included fish and sometimes turkey into my diet. I think its high time to cut those out again. So there's mine, what's yours?

First Post: My color branding definitions

I'll get this thing rolling in a way that any ex-philosophy major can appreciate: my own definitions of "color" branding.

Green: Environmentally, sustainable, Eco-conscious etc... any branding attempt that applies some area of the environmental movement to a product, service or company. I view Green branding as a good thing overall, I think the trend is helping companies become environmental leaders and requires them to be open and transparent (as there is nothing that and environmentalist loves more than digging up dirt on companies). Most attempts to "green" brand a company, unfortunately, fall short. It isn't enough to tell me your company is "enviornmentally conscious" you better have the facts to back it up. I'll attempt to highlight some companies that do this well.

Blue: Although I am completing stealing this term from Adam Werbach (let's say I am re-appropriating it, not stealing, it makes me sound like a friendlier person.) "Blue" branding is the next step in the process. Blue Branding is where an agency and client partnership changes the way a company does business, for the better. The easiest example off the top of my head is the pedigree and TBWA/Chiat/Day dogs rule campaign http://www.dogsrule.com/ in which Pedigree took the extra step to improve the lives of their employees and their pups by allowing pets at work, and helping to get pets adopted among other things. Blue branding is next level thought-leader branding. It should be the ultimate goal for an agency and I will try to post examples when I find them.

Black: These branding attempts are, unfortunately, going to be the easiest to find. "Black" branding is my new term for "green washing" or a way to label companies that make branding attempts that I feel are untruthful, racist, sexist, outlandish, or inappropriate. Black branding is what puts people in the advertising industry at the level of used-care salespeople and lawyers in the minds of 90% of the public. These branding attempts need to be called out into the public square, put in stocks, and drawn and quartered if they don't cease and desist. If we, as an industry, ever want to achieve positive change we need to distance ourselves from these aganecies and companies. Ill do my best to call them out when I see em.

I'll use these definitions to tag my posts, giving me a way to categorize them. I hope this will make everything clearer for everyone.