Most business owners usually experience challenges when it comes to sustainable brand positioning. Recent studies have indicated that most consumers are pleased to pay more money for sustainable products. And some consumers are also more likely to purchase goods that are labeled as environmentally friendly. The problem is that most consumers don’t know how to spot eco-friendly products. Worse, most of the consumers surveyed admitted that they rarely or don’t believe these eco-friendly claims.
The good news is that you can find some brand designers and marketers who authentically desire to highlight the environmentally-conscious characteristics of their products. On the other hand, others deliberately deceive their consumers in what is called greenwashing. This post discusses how your business can avoid greenwashing.
Greenwashing
It’s not long enough to just claim on your packaging that your business is committed to the environment by using imagery of sunlit forests and waterfalls alongside a certified organic label. Companies that offer customers a false impression of how their products are great for the environment in a practice that is called greenwashing can usually damage their reputation.
Simply put, greenwashing tends to involve a company attempting to get credit for its role in the sustainable world without having any intention of providing long-term environmental benefits, or it exaggerates the eco-friendly practices they are claiming.
Remember that sometimes these companies don’t usually try to deliberately deceive their consumers because unintentional greenwashing may happen over time. And, what was relevant over a couple of years ago may not be as relevant today. For example, packaging that shows that food products are naturally processed is a strong statement. But nowadays, the word ‘natural’ in a food product may mean nothing to many customers. Many consumers are now interested in farm-to-table, traceability, and bee-friendly certification of their food, so your company needs to stay a step ahead of your customers. You can visit www.utilitybidder.co.uk to learn more about greenwashing.
Ways you can avoid greenwashing
Sometimes, businesses are usually accused of greenwashing just because they put out poor communication to their target market. Labeling your products as environmentally friendly, green, or eco-friendly can backfire, especially if you don’t have any backing for these claims with real results and facts. Nowadays, these terms are utilized so often that consumers hardly notice them. In most cases, people consider these terms empty and superficial unless you can explain the reasons why your products have reduced the impact or even how much carbon dioxide they avoid.
Therefore, you need to replace these terms with some catchy slogans or phrases that have simple but measurable details, and they should be backed by data and facts. In this way, your audience can have a good understanding of your efforts, and they may have trust in your products.
With most entities including social media influencers and global trend-hunting firms telling people that they cannot miss out on recent fashion, it is easy for a business to go astray or get carried away. Understanding trends may be crucial for your company, but you need to have an analytical eye on this trend and be informed. A corporate sustainability strategy must maintain its core principles so that you can go in the right direction, especially when you decide to adopt various product solutions.
It’s a good idea to choose an option that fits your business strategy, your customer’s preferences and needs, and the legislative context of the market. Developing the proper product usually may take months or even years, but trends tend to change unpredictably, and sometimes they can disappear overnight.
If you run a chain of supermarkets that store a lot of flesh food products at the end of each day, then your cause can make little sense to consumers when you launch your initiative to clean oil spills from the oceans. There is a chance that you may receive some backlash when someone points out that you are diverting attention from specific areas where you can lower your impact on the planet.
It makes sense to consider creating original promotions so that you can offer nearly-expired products additional visibility, or even donate the food products to local shelters. This may spotlight your shortcomings, but your corporate image can benefit from your attempts to enhance the areas that you have better leverage.
In most cases, it’s a good practice to attempt and create sustainability activities that are in line with your business. This can also make a huge difference for places and consumers who are directly affected by the products you sell on the market.
When you encourage your staff members to avoid printing their emails, turn off the lights when they knock off, and use reusable drinking bottles, you are just promoting good habits. Recycling, not wasting resources, and taking small steps to do activities sustainably should be ingrained in your daily routines. These actions are commendable, though they may not be the highlight of your annual sustainability report.
But if you are determined to reduce your impact on the planet, you need to take wider actions to change things. This means you have to invest energy, time, and resources in sustainability activities. For example, you can choose to redesign your product so that more units can be placed in the same number of boxes. Alternatively, you can also bring new ideas to upcycle packaging. As you can see, there are various ways you can try to make a difference, which can be good for the reputation of your business.
The best way to ensure that your efforts are focused on sustainability is to measure them. You need to have a ballpark estimate of the initial corporate environmental footprint and take note of the areas where you can make some improvements. After doing this, you can then plan the right actions that may yield the tangible and right results. A product can go through a similar evaluation, especially when you introduce good sustainability features like recyclable options. You can compare the new version to the standard equivalent by doing a life cycle analysis. When you quantify the actual improvement, you can avoid guesswork in your decisions.
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