Environmental Leader reported today that CBS will be giving a stamp of approval, an “EcoAd” visual “digital” leaf on TV commercials, to its ‘eco-friendly’ TV advertisers. The pitch is that every time an advertiser buys an EcoAd package, a portion of the price will fund projects that public bodies have identified as critical yet underfunded.
Another eco-label? Ugh. Aren’t consumers confused enough about eco-labels?
All sounds good, but this begs the question: What are the criteria by which an advertiser earns the right to participate in the ‘Eco-Ad” program? And who’s providing oversight? Apparently, the EcoAd leaf is available to all TV sponsors. And some notorious greenwashers are already on CBS’s list of launch advertisers like Chevy, Safeway and PG&E.
Apparently it doesn’t matter if a company is an egregious polluter or spends tons of cash lobbying against environmental laws and regulations (two of several greenwash criteria as put forth in the 7 Sins of Greenwash and Greenpeace’s Greenwash Criteria). As long as they buy into the CBS program, they are now ‘environmentally friendly’?
Who gets hurt beside consumers? Real eco-entrepreneurs who cannot afford big ad buys on CBS. Eco-labels that can be bought for the price of a TV ad threaten to further erode consumer confidence and diminish the value of legitimate environmental practices.
I’m all for funneling money to environmental projects and giving companies that do so credit. But, CBS needs to have criteria for who participates in their Eco-Ad program or it just more greenwash.
A promo for the seal aired on the CBS television network yesterday, and can be seen at http://ecoad.cbs.com.
Photo: davidgljay at flickr.com
About Jennifer Kaplan
You couldn’t be more wrong on all the facts. If you have any interest in finding out the real situation, please e-mail me at sljacobs@cbs.com.
Shannon Jacobs
CBS Communications
It would be great if you could respond with “the real situation” here, in public, rather than asking for a private conversation with the author. If you can’d defend your policies in public, why even have PR?
Hi Shannon. I’d love to talk with Paul and I’d love to be proven wrong. I’ll follow-up by e-mail.
Readers: Hang tight for an update!
Interesting post. I agree that many companies are “greenwashing” more than ever now because it is the new “trend” and I don’t believe that most managers that are leading the green movement in companies are at all educated in sustainability. CBS needs more criteria to decide if a company can qualify for being “green.” However, I believe this will be another time when the large companies that can actually pay for air time will dominate without really proving themselves. I’m looking forward to your next post after more information becomes available to you from CBS.
Very interesting post on greenwashing. I agree with Julia that greenwashing is a trend and most managers supporting sustainability do not fully understand what it is. In particular, the impact of sustainability on environment, industries, companies, consumers and so on. What alternatives are there for advertisers to contribute to underfunded projects without undermining eco intentions? Also, what are some examples of recommended criteria for CBS’s Eco-Ad program?
Okay… so why is Chevy a greenwasher? Why is PG&E a greenwasher? What criteria are you using? What evidence do you have that CBS is blindly accepting these people? You’re making a lot of assumptions here without much evidence!
Dr Fish House— Greenpeace and Terrachoice, the watchdogs for greenwash, both name Chevy and PG&E as greenwashers. Lots of others too. If you read my follow-up post (http://wp.me/pVZQm-Tk), I spoke with the President of EcoMedia, who is responsible for the EcoAd program. He sent me the standards and told me himself how they ‘evaluate’ advertisers. Its not a blind process at all, just a very lax and subjective one. That doesn’t cut it for an ecolabel.