5 ways to spot greenwashing

Greenwashing is defined as “activities by a company or an organisation that are intended to make people think that it is concerned about the environment, even if its real business actually harms the environment.” Basically, it’s a marketing spin to make customers believe a business or product is sustainable when in reality it’s not.

I'm sure we're all spotting the ever-increasing amount of carbon-neutral, climate-positive or nature-positive products - but how many of us really know if it’s true or what that actually means? Here are our five top tips for identifying the fibbers:

1. Is there substance behind the buzzwords?

Loads of brands claim their products are “clean”, “green”, “natural”, “organic” (the list goes on), when in fact only a small proportion of their ingredients actually are. Read the label or check out the company’s sustainability page to work out if this is the case.

Certifications like B Corp and Science Based Targets prove a business is taking more action than most. Carbon labels are a simple, transparent way to establish a product’s impact on the environment (please shout if you’d like us to help carbon label your products).

2. What about their other products?

This is one for (fast) fashion brands in particular. They’ve been known to launch a massive campaign to promote one product that they claim is “sustainable”, even though the rest of their product range is causing deforestation in the Amazon. Just because one product is a bit less bad (and maybe comes in a cardboard box), doesn’t mean the rest aren’t. A couple of minutes on their website will give you an idea of their wider sustainability credentials.

3. Are they carbon neutral?

Anyone can balance their carbon emissions by buying carbon offsets. Offsets are easy to buy but not easy to understand. They’re not all regulated and this means that some offsetting programs are damaging local ecosystems and communities. If a business claims to be carbon neutral, make sure to check out which offsetting programs they support. (You can read our blog for a deeper dive into offsets.)

Also, as we’re all well aware, just offsetting emissions isn’t a future-proof solution. Some believe it gives them a green card to carry on putting tonnes of carbon into the atmosphere, rather than actually reducing emissions. For some, offsetting is a form of greenwashing. For us, as long as it comes second to legitimate efforts to reduce carbon emissions, being carbon neutral for now is better than nothing.

4. Can they explain how they are sustainable without using the word ‘sustainable’?

Maybe we just have a good ear for it, but it doesn’t take long to work out if a company lives and breathes sustainability. This is our go to question if we suspect someone of greenwashing. If they falter or give a rubbish answer it might well suggest that they’re just calling themselves ‘sustainable’.

5. Do they have a Net Zero target?

A fail-safe way to check if a company is committed to reducing its impact on the environment is if they’ve measured their carbon footprint and have set a Net Zero target for carbon reduction. This proves they’re taking the necessary action to reduce global temperature rise and, in turn, prevent catastrophic and irreversible damage to the planet.

Overall, we need a much higher standard of what can be called sustainable. The definition of sustainability is:

causing, or made in a way that causes, little or no damage to the environment and therefore able to continue for a long time.

If a company was to sell their product to everyone in the world, would there be no damage to world’s natural resources?