Shiny Green Button

Photo by Bob Jagendorf on Flickr

I’ve spent the past few weeks researching the sustainable clothing industry. Prior to this deep dive, I hadn’t thought much about it, but how clothes are created, transported and then disposed of has a huge impact on the planet.

Did you know:

• It can take more than 10 tonnes of water to grow enough cotton to make just one pair of jeans, according to Forum for the Future.
• About 80 percent of your clothing’s carbon footprint is related to how often and how you wash it. Just washing it in cold water helps.
• Clothing can be recycled into things like industrial cleaning rags. When you donate your used clothes to thrift stores, they often recycle the items that can’t be resold.

As clothing becomes cheaper, we buy more of it. It’s what the industry calls “fast fashion.” Everything is fast—the way clothing is made, how it gets into our hands, and then how long it takes us to chuck it when it gets a little worn or out of style.

The best thing we can do from an environmental standpoint is use what we’ve got longer, buy secondhand clothing and donate old clothes. Clothing manufacturers and retailers know this, but they’re not going make a profit by persuading their customers not to buy new clothes. So what do they do?

Maybe stories are the answer?

Clothes are so integral to our sense of style and individuality. They carry our history with them. It’s easy to trash a T-shirt you bought for $5, but not those Levi’s you wore all through college. Not the Nike running shoes you wore to run your first marathon.

When it comes to sustainability, maybe the best thing a clothing manufacturer can do is invest in its brand. Give consumers a chance to share their clothing stories through websites, blogs, social media—who knows? Maybe even a mechanism that lets consumers learn where their clothing ends up after they’ve donated it. Give consumers a different way to scratch that itch for style, by equating the coolness of the clothes with the coolness of where they’ve been, what they’ve done, what they witnessed. Give them a reason to buy your brand, by giving your clothes meaning beyond looking good right now.

Photo credit: Norman B. Leventhal Map Center on Flickr

While reading a recent article in Nature magazine about nine environment systems and humanity’s effects on their health, I saw two excellent examples of how the same information can be presented in two very different ways. These two examples are great to keep in mind when developing your own CSR report, presentation or anything for publication. Does your audience need and want the numbers? Or is your audience better served by an easy-to-understand graphic that, while lacking the nitty-gritty details, gives them the big picture?

Example 1 is a table showing hard, number-driven data. This format is great for the data, but it requires some studying and comparison before the meaning of those numbers clicks into place.

Example 2 is a less precise, but representative graphic. It trades the numbers and science speak for a quick graphical interpretation that readers can grasp in just seconds.

Red? Bad. The state of biodiversity? Sad.

Even though it’s one of the most basic rules, it can never be repeated too often: always keep your audience in mind. If your company is developing a report for analysts and NGOs, go ahead and treat them to numbers. But if you’re speaking to the masses, give them something useful. That doesn’t mean dumb it down. It means going the extra step to make an impact.

1. Seventh Generation : Clorox Green Works :: Nau : ______

2. Climate change : Exxon :: Water scarcity : ______

3. Toyota : Tesla :: HP : ______

4. Farmers’ market : Whole Foods :: Public transportation : ______

5. Walmart : Nike :: GE : ______

This column, “Revolutionise CR reporting,” in the UK edition of AdWeek is worth a read.  Mark Line of Two Tomorrows, a sustainability consultancy, succinctly makes the case for companies to shift from lengthy CR reporting to dialogue-driven communications. He writes:

With the upsurge in online activity, maybe it’s time for reports to be built not only on company-generated content, but also as a channel for the voices of those affected by the company … Reporting can be a real catalyst for change. To succeed in the future, it has to become infinitely more two-way – not just a static tool to inform, but a prompt for challenging and exchanging of views on the issues that matter.

He points to the Guardian’s sustainability site as one that’s blazing a path in real-time reporting.

I agree with Line (see this post about Timberland), and the only thing I’d add to his point is that taking advantage of the technology and trends to make CR reporting more interactive must be accompanied by a genuine commitment to engage in the dialogue.

For many companies, a CR report involves a substantial investment of time and money, but it’s likely concentrated in a production window of a few months. Moving to a platform that encourages greater interactivity and exchange of ideas requires an ongoing investment and a willingness to think of the CR report not as an event, but as a practice. That might seem an obvious point, but it has potentially broad implications for how CR practitioners set priorities, assign resources, build skills and measure success.

By Mr Conguito on Flickr

I’m not talking about whether it’s printed on recycled paper using soy-based inks. Though that’s a nice start. (Better yet, go digital!)

I’m talking about what’s inside your handbook. Do your employee policies support your organization’s sustainability goals?

When AHA! created our first employee handbook (award-winning, I might add) a few years back, sustainability wasn’t top of mind the way it is today. However, as we were working through draft after draft, our creative team couldn’t help but discuss the impact of our company’s policies. What did the term “work/life balance” really mean? How could our policies contribute to the success of our company and our clients, plus make time available for employees to contribute to their communities? That, after all, is at the heart of true sustainability: the impact of what you do on people and the planet.

For example, AHA!’s time-off policies just allowed me to take a whopping two-week stretch of vacation. That’s more than most Americans get in a whole year. The average is 12 days a year, and only half of U.S. employees take the full vacation. What did I do on my vacation? Planted some fall veggies, made and froze tomato sauce from the gazillion tomatoes in my garden, read a bunch of library books, sewed buttons on clothing that’s been sitting in a pile for ages.  Chatted with my neighbors over the fence. And I walked. And walked. I hardly got in my car at all. Isn’t that what we’re supposed to do if we want to save the world?

Think about it from a communications standpoint too. Your employee handbook is one of the first points of communication with your new employees. It’s an opportunity to make a good first impression and set up your employees for success. If sustainability is a part of your company’s business strategy, your handbook is a chance to show your employees how they can personally contribute.

Here’s an idea: think beyond creating a sustainability statement or section. How can you integrate your sustainability goals into the existing content? Does your company consider sustainability when making decisions about benefits, company travel or your paid time-off policies? (Just to name a few.) Then make sure your employees know about it! If sustainability considerations show up throughout, that demonstrates real commitment, and not just lip service.

On Wednesday, I attended the Sustainable Industries economic forum in downtown Portland. Paul Hawken was the keynote. He focused his talk on the challenges we face transitioning from fossil fuels to renewable energy sources. Although this was familiar ground for most in attendance, Hawken brought new perspective to the issue, delivering both a sobering (perhaps depressing) and hopeful message.

He cautioned us to think of the unrelenting news about climate change and other urgent environmental issues as neither good nor bad. It’s just information—and information is the engine of opportunity. In other words, it’s what we do with the information that matters. Rather than see the worst and be overwhelmed by a sense of powerlessness, we should feel inspired by opportunity and empowered to act.

Yet Hawken pointed out there is a place for climate change pessimists, which he called “doomers.” They exist, he said, to make the designers of solutions brilliant. Designers are motivated to prove the doomers wrong, to do what’s necessary and figure out later whether it was possible.

The bulk of Hawken’s talk took its cue from what he called the Red Queen dilemma, namely that “It takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place” (from Through the Looking-Glass by Lewis Carroll). While we need to drastically cut our reliance on fossil fuels to slow the rate of climate change, we also need to increase our consumption just to maintain our current quality of life.

That’s because we need more energy to extract increasingly marginal resources that keep civilization running until renewable sources of energy can be produced on a massive scale. The largest new oil fields are under miles of ocean and sand. The easy veins of copper, zinc and other vital metals are tapped; we’re working with declining, less productive mines. We have to drill deeper and deeper into aquifers to get our water. And so on.

The problem is, the rate of bringing new sources of energy online in time to mitigate the worst of climate change seems almost impossible. I didn’t capture the specifics Hawken rattled off, but it essentially requires us to begin adding staggering numbers of solar panels, wind turbines, wave generators and even nuclear power plants every minute for the next 25 years.

At this point, all the air went out of the room. There was a palpable sense of doom.

But Hawken was undeterred. “You should all be smiling,” he reminded us. “Think of the opportunities.”

Industries need to organize to accelerate progress, he said. The U.S. building industry, for one, is the largest green NGO in the world, and it is having success creating a new industry around green standards. (Hawken acknowledged you could debate whether they were going far enough.) Where are the similar organizations for the banking, chemical or other industries, he asked?

And there are emerging technologies that don’t limit us to current constraints that make a daunting challenge seem impossible. For example, a solar panel made of more efficient but less toxic and energy-intensive materials that can be printed could leapfrog our ability to generate energy from the sun. Just 70 minutes of sunlight, Hawken said, is the equivalent of the entire world’s energy use.

There are enormous opportunities to reduce energy use, too. While increasing the supply side of the equation is sexy, lowering demand is where the real action is, Hawken said. There are countless innovations to be discovered and huge money to be made. It’s all there, everything we need, in the information. The rest is up to us.

I’ve been thinking about milestones lately. Last week marked six years with AHA!. Today is my wedding anniversary. My son is starting kindergarten, my daughter’s third birthday is in a couple of weeks, and my birthday follows next month.

What’s struck me is how we commemorate milestones. We take pictures, send cards, throw parties, give gifts, offer well-wishes and follow other rituals.  They’re triggers for communications and sharing that everyone recognizes in some way or another, whether it’s taking a moment to reflect on our own milestone or acknowledge someone else’s.

The same holds true for companies. Milestones prompt press releases and spawn ad campaigns. They’re cited as proof points to support broader messages, invoked to justify decisions and used to establish credibility or leadership.

This seems especially true when it comes to communicating corporate responsibility. Companies are eager to demonstrate commitment and progress, and they tout milestones as evidence that they’re doing the right thing.

Because the vocabulary and discourse of corporate responsibility are still in their formative stages, milestones can be particularly useful for communications. They represent something tangible, something measured. We don’t even necessarily need to understand the details for a milestone to be meaningful. We’re conditioned to think they have some inherent importance (or they wouldn’t be milestones), so we may accept them at face value, recognizing what they signify (progress, credibility, etc.) rather than examining what they actually mean.

I don’t mean to be overly cynical. I think milestones can be a legitimate part of effective CR communications. But they offer a much bigger and more valuable opportunity than simply marking progress.

Whether personal or organizational, milestones can also be catalysts for assessment and analysis, giving us the time and space to reflect back and project ahead. In many ways, they offer us a pause button, an excuse to set aside the urgency of the day-to-day and delve into the whys and hows of our thinking and action. To examine what’s working and what’s not, and apply those insights to calibrate and clarify our communication platform.

Milestones can also prompt dialogue and collaboration. They’re a reason to bring people together. It can be as simple as a celebration, which can spark creativity and insights while building relationships. But you can also go deeper and convene a group to participate in assessment and analysis, encouraging them to offer their perspective on the underlying strategy of your milestones.

It’s not an either/or proposition. Milestones are good fodder for CR announcements. But if you’re not using them to take a measured look at your strategy and communications, you’re missing an opportunity for greater impact.

Via Best Green Blogs, I found this remarkable site—Ecological Tales for Environmental Education—that uses traditional stories to teach children in India about the environment. The most recent series of posts focuses on honey gatherers, describing how various tribes have long gone about harvesting honey from local forests.

The blog features artwork, embeds video and even offers lesson plans to help teachers bring these stories into the classroom. The blog is maintained by Muriel Kakani, an author and illustrator who has traveled throughout India discovering its ecological traditions.

Beyond the fascinating content, I was taken by the premise of the site. Using stories to make complex information more accessible and meaningful is a common technique. But what I love about this site is how Kakani uses colorful illustrations to make her stories more active and vibrant, setting a richer mood and suggesting larger meaning without being heavy handed.

It’s a reminder (for me, at least) that effective storytelling isn’t necessarily about the quality of the writing. It’s about engaging the imagination and prompting an emotional response, often by translating big events or ideas or challenges into human scale.

As I tackle my assignments each day, it’s easy to get caught up in the mechanics of writing clear messages and concise copy. And for some purposes and some audiences, that’s what’s needed. But there are times when the most on-target message or technically sound copy falls flat. Rather than automatically diving into revisions, I think that’s a sign to take a step back and instead consider other ways—even other media—that go beyond communicating information to telling a story that resonates as authentic and true.

A few odds & ends to round out the week:

A recent survey of green consumers found that (a) their biggest priority, by a wide margin, is the economy, not the environment and (b) there is widespread misunderstanding about basic issues, such as the impact of CO2 (e.g., half said that it depletes the ozone layer). The not-so-surprising conclusion? Stereotypes about green consumers limit the effectiveness of marketing communications. See Sustainable Business for the full story.

A column on GreenBiz by Richard Seireeni of The Brand Architect Group makes the interesting observation that Japan’s cultural obsession with perfection is at odds with sustainability. For example, only fruit that looks perfect makes it to the grocery—any apple or pear that has a bruise or even is a bit misshapen is tossed. This culling happens at every phase of the supply chain, from farmer through distributor to the grocery itself, leading to massive waste. Those pieces of fruit that do get through the gantlet are individually and intricately wrapped. Together, this tendency to throw out perfectly good products (including clothes, tatami mats and even cars) and use excessive packaging puts Japan behind the sustainability curve, even as it leads in other areas, such as producing hybrid vehicles. All of which suggests there is an enormous need for a long-term communications effort to raise awareness and change behaviors in Japan. But it won’t be easy, given how culturally ingrained these behaviors are.

Sustainability is a focus of this month’s issue of Harvard Business Review. The lead story, “Why Sustainability is Now the Key Driver of Innovation,” lays out the five stages of adopting sustainability, ranging from compliance to developing new business models and creating new platforms for business practices. It’s not necessarily groundbreaking, but the article does do a good job of using real-world examples to succinctly make the business case for investing in sustainability.

On Sustainablog, this review of Less is More: Embracing simplicity for a healthy planet, a caring economy and lasting happiness, a new book by Cecile Andrews and Wanda Urbanska, sounds promising. It speaks to the growing trend of people pulling back from the stress-ridden, career-focused, material-driven lifestyle (in part because of the economy) in pursuit of happiness and fulfillment. Great. But whenever I get the urge to buy a new book about sustainability or simplicity, I’m caught in a Catch-22—doesn’t the act of buying something go against both of those goals? I could wait for it show up at the library (or invest in a Kindle), I suppose, but it generally takes weeks, if not months, to get a copy of a new book from our local library. And I’m not inclined to drop $300 right now (to say nothing of the longer-term question of e-waste). What’s a reader with a conscience to do?

I  like what Mini is doing with its Carfun campaign. You can debate the true impact of carbon offsets or whether a company that peddles combustion engines should be touting sustainability, but purely from a communications standpoint, this campaign is on brand.

First, it’s about fun—you donate $30 to one of three organizations dedicated to sustainability, and Mini makes a matching donation to one of three organizations focused on fun (such as one that promotes bicycle safety among kids).

Second, it feels at home in the interactive/web-based experience that’s characteristic of Mini.

And third, it gives you something (you get a badge made of recycled materials for your donation). Mini likes to include interesting tchotchkes in their advertising (stickers, etc) and often sends owners whimsical or intriguing items.

I only wish Mini had an electric (or even fuel cell) car in the works. Given the cachet of the Mini brand, it could really up the cool/fun factor of cars that I suspect will largely be viewed as virtuous/utilitarian (I’m thinking of the Chevy Volt).

Tesla has a shot of doing this with the electric mid-sized sedan it has in the works, but Mini—though a niche brand—has more of a track record to work with.