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.