Ad agencies 'harming global warming efforts'

by Colin Marrs, Campaign 29-Apr-08, 12:15

Only one of the UK’s top ad agencies has any plans to extend its green policy to client relationships, according to a report published today.

The Greenwash Guide was produced by the green communications company Futerra.

It said exaggerated claims in ads about the green benefits of products could undermine the drive to combat global warming.

Solitaire Townsend, the chief executive of Futerra, said: “Greenwash isn’t simply annoying; it’s dangerous."

During a time of economic belt-tightening, if green products and services are to survive, then people have to trust them.”

The survey found reluctance among the ad agencies to change the way they advertised.

One managing director was quoted as saying: “If a car company has invented the world’s first hybrid super car, which might still be very polluting, then as an agency, we could not turn to the client and tell them to sell it on the free sat-nav instead of the environment.”

The report authors said that the Advertising Standards Authority should take action to produce guidelines on green advertising.

It also found that out of 39 media outlets surveyed, only three had heard the term “greenwashing”.

View The Greenwash Guide

Comments

Nuts n Seeds - 29/04/2008

In nine cases out of ten, greenwash reflects worse on the client than the agency. It's the client that signs off the campaign. It's the client that decides how much spin is unethical. It's the client who decides whether a claim is justified or not. Similarly, when a client takes an ethical or responsible stance, it's they who take the credit, not the agency publicising it. Sounds like a kop out? Here's an example. An agency doesn't know whether a new engine is REALLY a polar-bear-cuddling homage to Mother Earth, or a cynical, token effort to support a green message. They're not engineers, or climate scientists. Of course there are times when agencies know damn well they're painting the grass green (to borrow a known practise of the Chinese government). But it's the client's ultimate responsibility to ensure what goes to air is either true or clearly justifiable. The big concern is not that agencies are complicit in greenwashing, which is certainly the case. It's that clients have little interest in green issues beyond + and - PR. Why? Because in the UK at least, successive governments have done diddly squat to incentivise the sale of green products and services.