It seems more and more companies are jumping on the 'green' bandwagon these days, touting their products as "eco-friendly" and "all-natural. But did you know the majority of those companies are just making 'greenwashed' claims? What is green washing exactly, you ask? 'The Seven Sins of Greenwashing' says: "Green?wash (gr?n’w?sh’, -wôsh’) – verb: the act of misleading consumers regarding the environmental practices of a company or the environmental benefits of a product or service."
The Seven Sins site was created by TerraChoice Environmental Marketing, a science-based marketing firm that performs market research on so-called 'green' products in the US, UK, Canada, and Australia in their bi-annual Greenwashing Report. It aims to educate consumers about the deadly sins of greenwashing and how to avoid products committing these sins.
This article appears in Mar 3-9, 2010.