Greenwashing 101

With buzzwords like sustainable and eco-friendly used to tantalize us into guilt free shopping, much of which further plagues the planet, it can be hard to know who to trust. Nowadays, everyone says their products are sustainable, but what does that even mean? More often than not, it means absolutely nothing. “Sustainability” has become a marketing term more than anything else.

Introducing greenwashing: the act of marketing a product as sustainable when it’s not.

Brands (big and small) are guilty of relying on green-leaf campaigns to sell nylon and polyester products. Their hope is that sustainability messaging is enough, regardless of their design or production process. And unfortunately, it’s working.

Consumers are falling for it time and time again. Because there isn’t an industry standard for sustainability, consumers who are trying to do the “right thing” but don’t have the time or resources to truly understand what that means, are left falling victim to greenwashing. While there are a handful of stamps brands can receive for their sustainability efforts, none are mainstream enough for the average consumer to understand and embrace them. Brands take advantage of this naïveté and use it to their advantage.

It doesn’t help that there are a million ways to be sustainable, and one isn’t necessarily better than the other. A brand that uses recycled textiles may argue that they’re more sustainable than a brand that uses organic cotton. It’s like pinning two good guys against one another, and getting so distracted that the villain ends up winning. This is where greenshaming comes in.

Almost as bad as greenwashing, is greenshaming. Aka criticizing a brand, business or consumer for not being sustainable because they aren’t perfect.

There’s no such thing as perfection when it comes to sustainability — but there are a handful of ways that we can all be more sustainable. And that’s where there is opportunity for impact.

When we make sustainability this unattainable target, we often hear from people, “my impact won’t matter anyway, so why bother”. We want to empower as many of those people as possible to bother. To bother with recycling (even if they’re not really sure what goes where). To bother with mending (even if their first few attempts look horrible). To bother with shopping small & slow (even when they’re not sure where to start).

Every time we shame a brand, business or consumer for not being sustainable (according to whatever that means to us) we lose. We get so distracted by this battle of “I’m more sustainable”, “no I’M more sustainable” that we lose sight of the real problem: big business. Being small and scrappy (pun intended) is sustainable. Being collaborative and community-oriented is sustainable. Being transparent and accessible is sustainable.

That’s the kind of sustainability we’re excited about. Not the kind that makes you feel bad for not being perfect. At its core, sustainability is a mindset. it’s a state of questioning each and every purchase: do I need this, how long will I have it, who made it, how did they make it, and so on. It’s a checklist of requirements that consumers need to evaluate as they make purchases.

Similarly, sustainability is a design process. It’s the act of creating items with certain considerations in place: can I make this out of pre-existing materials, how can I minimize or eliminate waste as I make this, and so on. It’s a new standard of production that offers consumers a unique opportunity to purchase something beautiful, without further damaging the planet.

To shop and design sustainably is to do so slowly. To take the time to learn about the items we’re buying, to be willing to wait a bit longer for them to be made, to keep them in our closets and homes a bit longer. Slowing down the consumer cycle won’t solve all of our problems, but it sure will help. And while we still have a ways to go, as a society, we're starting to learn the power of our dollar. If we take the time to learn more about the brands we're supporting, and the businesses we're choosing to keep afloat, we may be able to move in the right direction.