It's A Case of L.L. Beanwash

The L.L. Bean brand used to connote squeaky-clean business practices with a heavy dose of earth friendliness. No more.

The venerable outdoorsy Bean brand is now connected to a rather egregious greenwashing effort – a crude attempt to squeeze extra profits by making unfounded environmental claims.

“Go Paperless and help keep the world green,” advises a recent promotion to holders of L.L. Bean Visa cards. “Paperless statements are . . . better for the environment. Eliminating paper statements conserves trees and energy,” advises an email, without providing a shred of evidence or even a link to anything backing up the claim.

The real culprit may be Barclaycard, the banking organization that actually issues the cards in a partnership with Bean. Barclaycard is apparently behind the promotion – and the business whose coffers would presumably become “greener” if more customers opted out of printed, mailed statements.

The Barclay bank conglomerate’s somewhat sketchy sustainability reporting provides no evidence that its digital processing is inherently more earth friendly than ink on paper. Its main response to climate change is the purchase of carbon credits to offset its 1-million-tons plus annual emissions of greenhouse gases. A fair portion of those emissions apparently were the result of its data centers, which consumed 332 gigawatt hours of energy in 2011, a 4% increase over 2010.

And what about Barclay’s progress in 2012? Who knows – it hasn’t published its environmental data for last year yet. (Note to Barclay: We’re now in the second half of 2013. It’s time to reveal what you did to the earth last year.)

Bean’s environmental efforts – including the use of paper with recycled and sustainably forested fiber, green buildings, and participation in the EPA’s voluntary Climate Leaders program – seem exemplary. But, like Barclay, Bean's sustainability reporting is far less detailed or revealing than what’s typically published by much smaller and less profitable printing and paper companies that are being indirectly slandered by the "Beanwash” campaign.

By allowing its name to be used in such a tawdry fashion, Bean is damaging its credibility and reputation. Could it be another Toshiba, which made unfounded anti-print green claims that ultimately failed to distract attention from its shady environmental record? (See 9 Lessons From Toshiba's No-Print-Day Debacle.)

The good news is that print-oriented industries are fighting back. The latest effort is the Ecographic Challenge issued by the U.S. branch of Two Sides. The non-profit advocacy group will award a $2,500 cash prize to the designer of the infographic that best demonstrates “the sustainability of print and paper in a way that’s fun and easy to understand.” Details are here.

To prime the pump, Deborah Corn of Print Media Centr has created three ecographics that challenge vague claims about switching from print to the coal-fired internet. My favorite is this fun “Save the Batteries! Harvest a Tree” message.

For further reading:

• Going Paperless Doesn't Mean Going Green, The New York Times Proves
• Google Using Blatant Greenwash To Promote New Catalog App
• Killah in Manilla: Hearst's Green Reputation Tarnished by Subsidiary

Anti-Greenwash Group To Challenge E-Billing Claims in the U.S.

U.S. companies now might want to think twice about promoting paperless billing by sending those "go green, go paperless" messages to their customers.

Two Sides, the industry-backed organization that has successfully challenged the truthfulness of such claims in the U.K. and Europe, announced the opening of a U.S. branch today.

The mission of Two Sides U.S. will be "to promote the sustainability of paper and print in the U.S. market," said Kevin Gammonley, CEO of NPTA Alliance, a trade association of paper merchants that is helping the U.S. branch get off the ground. "In our first phase of fundraising, we have received commitments from over 30 paper distributors who have decided to become early adopters of Two Sides in the U.S."

Before Two Sides revved up in the U.K., the Two Sides announcement said, "Research ... revealed that "43% of the major banks, 70% of telecoms and 30% of utilities were using misleading environmental statements to support their marketing messages, thereby conflicting with current advertising regulations which are in place in most countries."

"In 2010, Two Sides launched a campaign to target companies who claim that switching to online communication is better for the environment without verifiable supporting evidence," said Two Sides founder Martyn Eustace. "As a result, Two Sides has so far convinced 27 out of 33 major corporations to change their environmental claims or use wording that doesn’t include misleading or incorrect statements related to e-billing."

"We will be tailoring the campaign to the U.S. paper and print media market to ensure people understand that the responsible use of print and paper is a sustainable and effective way of communicating, said Phil Riebel, an environmental consultant and columnist who helped organize the U.S. branch. "A number of major pulp and paper producers and a large U.S. brand-name retailer" have joined the U.S. campaign.

For more information about how dead-tree (paper-based) communication stacks up environmentally against dead-dinosaur (electronic) methods, please see:

• 5 Brutally Honest Green-Themed Promotions I'd Like To See: Note the imaginary bank-statement insert acknowledging that the only thing green about going paperless is the money the bank will save.
• Newspapers Are Greener Than Web News, Says Environmental Expert 
• Smackdown: Printed Editions vs. Digital Edition