Sustainability for profit: AKA Greenwashing

Every brand you know has dropped a ‘sustainable’ collection or an alternative product to recycle or contribute to net zero. As I explained last week, the government is pushing us with all manner of green policies so everyone has to appear to do something ‘sustainable’. I say sustainable very loosely in this regard; fast-fashion companies dropping a ‘sustainable’ line means very little when they’re creating 92 million tons of waste a year. H&M for example, have a whole tab on their website called “sustainability”, where they show us the recycled buttons/sequins they used in their latest collection. If you dig a little deeper you will often find, brands can not change their whole business model built on low production cost, so the ‘recycled’ materials they are using is often just the buttons, sequins, thread and sometime just the cardboard tag & because technically they aren’t lying, they did use one ‘recycled’ element, they can claim it to be a ‘sustainable’ collection. This isn’t even the tip of the iceberg when it comes to greenwashing…

‘Sustainable’ scandals over the years:

• Volkswagen - admitted to cheating emissions tests

• BP - claimed to have low carbon products because they installed a few solar panels when 90% of their products are oil and gas

• Starbucks - released a strawless lid, the new lid contains more plastic than the old lid and straw combined

• IKEA - was found to be illegally logging in ukraine 

• Banks - all major banks claim to have some kind of green campaign whilst also actively investing and lending to companies that contribute the most to global warming, fossil fuels and deforestation

Inevitably, whenever a new industry pops up, there will be someone trying to take advantage of it to make money. This is not a crime, especially if you spin up something useful, but there is a big difference in trying to make your business sustainable and outright lying/misleading. When thinking about sustainability, you have to look at the whole business, not just one product. You either are or are not a sustainable business from beginning to end. It has to be a core value, not an add on because it is fashionable. I expect more greenwashing in the future as the world starts to care, but when looking at anything that claims to be ‘sustainable’, it is always worth checking the whole business and then if it actually will provide value in the long run (we’ll explore the car industry in another article). Slapping a green sticker on something doesn’t make it sustainable, regardless of what they try to tell us. I hope ESG and more people being interested will unpick a lot of false claims we will see in the future.

In other news…

• Volkswagen is reorganising it’s sustainable division (can’t imagine why)

• Scientists have created a new/better plastic 

• Swiss women are taking their government to court over their climate change policy because heat waves kill older women

• The banks are melting (this has nothing to do with sustainability of the earth just humanity)

This is our 4th ever newsletter and I would love your feedback, please email [email protected] with any thoughts 😊