Do People Care?
Saqqara Aleister
January 30, 2008
That, my friend, is the multi-million dollar question. Do people care? Care about the environment, care about the earth falling apart? If one was to believe science fiction writers of old, we are all in for a very rough life if we donīt get our act together and sooner rather than later.
In a world filled with words like carbon offsets {whatever the heck they really are}, organic, sustainability, global warming, melting icecaps, increasing oceans (or decreasing oceans, depending on who you talk to), deforestation, water shortage, oil shortage, hybrid, recycle, what is one supposed to do? What is the most important issue? A person could go cross-eyed trying to figure out just what one is supposed to be doing to help the environment, much less what one should do about it.
Then there is the quote, "make people care". Courtesy of world explorer, TV host, author, and wilderness educator Josh Bernstein, this was his charge to a group of advertising executives, journalists, and other assorted marketing types at Ad Ageīs first ever Green Marketing Conference in June 2007. An excellent and clear line of thinking, but how exactly do you accomplish that?
For the purpose of this article, there will be four classes: Ordinary Jo (your average housewife), Mountain Man Dean (the guy who lives off the land), Richie Rich (representative of the people who have money and live "green" because itīs the in thing), and the collective advertisers/companies who go hand in hand, supposedly selling these groups of people products that theyīve asked for.
When making a comment like "make people care", the first question would be, care about what? The environment, money, doing something really worthwhile? The advertisers and companies are the easiest to convince; if theyīll be able to make a buck at it, theyīll invest millions. So when one of them gets the idea that they can guilt the public into buying one product at $2.99 when the regular product {with the exact same ingredients} is $1.99, they realize theyīll make an extra dollar AND get the environmentalists who werenīt buying from them before.
Richie Rich is quite easy as well. If they can get their picture in the New York Times seemingly doing something good and socially acceptable, theyīre up for it and will spend big bucks in order to be there. Whether it be shelling out ten thousand for a table at the latest fund raiser to save the jaguars in South America, or donating enough money to build an animal rescue facility, in the end, itīs probably mostly an effort to make them feel less guilty.
Now the real losers in the game are Mountain Man Dean and Ordinary Jo. Ordinary Jo, being your average all-American housewife, sheīs busy raising three kids and a dog, and trying, in vain, to pull it all together by dinnertime every night. Her interests lie more in making the right choices for her children, and wanting to make sure they have a world left to live in when they grow up. Mountain Man Dean, who lives off the land (where land is getting sparse) laments the loss of not only his home and resources that he depends on, but the fact that itīs due to poor planning, and nobody really seems to care. Every available piece of land being built on, either for another strip mall {when the one down the street just closed and is standing empty), or for more big houses that will sit empty because no one can afford to buy them.
These are the people that need to care, or rather, need to keep on caring, because they already do. These are the people who will effect real change in the world, even if they donīt feel like they have much of a voice. They are more powerful than they realize. They can voice their opinions not only by buying products, but by electing government officials who really understand and care. But who would Ordinary Jo buy from?
Ordinary Jo reads magazines and watches television shows, which in turn, means seeing advertising. Advertising introduces the products they should be using in order to be more environmentally friendly. But who sells Ordinary Jo these products? Richie Rich. Honestly, who would Ordinary Jo rather buy from; men like Josh Bernstein, Jeff Corwin, and Philippe Cousteau .or Mountain Man Dean, who looks like the guy from the Burtīs Bees package?
Do this new crop of "caring" Richie Rich hawkers really believe in what they are selling, or in the underlying cause of why said products were created? Names like Bernstein, Corwin, Cousteau, DiCaprio, Gore, and de Rothchilds seem, on the outside, to live the life they talk about. But do they use the products they are trying to sell Ordinary Jo, or embrace the lifestyle they are promoting?
The other part of the multi-million dollar question is this: if you go into the grocery store, trying to be more environmentally aware and friendly, and you read product labels, does it make you mad when you find that two products, from the same company, have different labels but the exact same ingredients? Or did it make you mad because you simply fell for the hawkersī spiel in the commercial or ad?
Did you buy the product based on actually wanting to do the right thing, because the product really worked, or because of the good-looking guy selling it? Did you donate a weekīs worth of grocery money to the same guyīs charity because you truly believe they are doing good or because of someoneīs looks? Not many people donate to the causes of the rain forest when they see an ad featuring local natives, but when the charity gets someone like Jeff Corwin speaking for them, the donations skyrocket.
Not to make celebrity involvement in a cause out to be a totally bad thing, of course. People listen when their favorite celebrities speak, and if more people get on board because of it, then this is a case of everyone benefiting, even if those involved donīt quite understand all the implications of WHY itīs good. Due to the nature of the green movement—any change, no matter how small, is a help, as long as itīs the real McCoy—and thatīs where "buyer beware" and being an informed consumer comes into play.
Sure, we all NEED to start doing things that are more environmentally friendly. But we first need to start thinking about the reasons we arenīt doing something more then why we are. If you truly want to become more "green", change your ingredients. Make your ingredients different from everyone elseīs; donīt go buy a hybrid just because Leo DiCaprio drives one. If a hybrid will not do the job for you, donīt waste the money—just be more aware of the amount of driving and fossil fuels you use. Try to buy locally grown fruits and vegetables in order to become more locally sustainable in your community. Be more aware of your community and what is available in it.
Places like Trader Joeīs and Whole Foods certainly have organic locally grown foods, but with all the talk of "organic is better for you", the prices are also somewhere in the range of expensive to flat out unaffordable for most people. The fact that everyone is hollering for everyone to eat better, you would think the food that is better for you would be cheaper in order for you to buy it, but itīs not so.
Donīt buy organic cotton clothing because you think the guy in the ad is hot or your favorite celebrity wears it. Chances are they donīt and if you happen on them wearing one, they got it for free. Itīs called advertising, and it doesnīt cost the company very much to give away a few items here and there at celebrity events. In becoming more "green", we all need to become more aware of the real reasons why we need to be, if not for ourselves, for the children of the future.
Do people really care? Yes, they really care. People would love to be doing more, but for Ordinary Jo, most of doing good is just not affordable. The most important aspect of the environmental movement should not be to sell the change, but instead to INSPIRE the change. The rest will fall into place if consumers are vocal about what they want.
In a world filled with words like carbon offsets {whatever the heck they really are}, organic, sustainability, global warming, melting icecaps, increasing oceans (or decreasing oceans, depending on who you talk to), deforestation, water shortage, oil shortage, hybrid, recycle, what is one supposed to do? What is the most important issue? A person could go cross-eyed trying to figure out just what one is supposed to be doing to help the environment, much less what one should do about it.
Then there is the quote, "make people care". Courtesy of world explorer, TV host, author, and wilderness educator Josh Bernstein, this was his charge to a group of advertising executives, journalists, and other assorted marketing types at Ad Ageīs first ever Green Marketing Conference in June 2007. An excellent and clear line of thinking, but how exactly do you accomplish that?
For the purpose of this article, there will be four classes: Ordinary Jo (your average housewife), Mountain Man Dean (the guy who lives off the land), Richie Rich (representative of the people who have money and live "green" because itīs the in thing), and the collective advertisers/companies who go hand in hand, supposedly selling these groups of people products that theyīve asked for.
When making a comment like "make people care", the first question would be, care about what? The environment, money, doing something really worthwhile? The advertisers and companies are the easiest to convince; if theyīll be able to make a buck at it, theyīll invest millions. So when one of them gets the idea that they can guilt the public into buying one product at $2.99 when the regular product {with the exact same ingredients} is $1.99, they realize theyīll make an extra dollar AND get the environmentalists who werenīt buying from them before.
Richie Rich is quite easy as well. If they can get their picture in the New York Times seemingly doing something good and socially acceptable, theyīre up for it and will spend big bucks in order to be there. Whether it be shelling out ten thousand for a table at the latest fund raiser to save the jaguars in South America, or donating enough money to build an animal rescue facility, in the end, itīs probably mostly an effort to make them feel less guilty.
Now the real losers in the game are Mountain Man Dean and Ordinary Jo. Ordinary Jo, being your average all-American housewife, sheīs busy raising three kids and a dog, and trying, in vain, to pull it all together by dinnertime every night. Her interests lie more in making the right choices for her children, and wanting to make sure they have a world left to live in when they grow up. Mountain Man Dean, who lives off the land (where land is getting sparse) laments the loss of not only his home and resources that he depends on, but the fact that itīs due to poor planning, and nobody really seems to care. Every available piece of land being built on, either for another strip mall {when the one down the street just closed and is standing empty), or for more big houses that will sit empty because no one can afford to buy them.
These are the people that need to care, or rather, need to keep on caring, because they already do. These are the people who will effect real change in the world, even if they donīt feel like they have much of a voice. They are more powerful than they realize. They can voice their opinions not only by buying products, but by electing government officials who really understand and care. But who would Ordinary Jo buy from?
Ordinary Jo reads magazines and watches television shows, which in turn, means seeing advertising. Advertising introduces the products they should be using in order to be more environmentally friendly. But who sells Ordinary Jo these products? Richie Rich. Honestly, who would Ordinary Jo rather buy from; men like Josh Bernstein, Jeff Corwin, and Philippe Cousteau .or Mountain Man Dean, who looks like the guy from the Burtīs Bees package?
Do this new crop of "caring" Richie Rich hawkers really believe in what they are selling, or in the underlying cause of why said products were created? Names like Bernstein, Corwin, Cousteau, DiCaprio, Gore, and de Rothchilds seem, on the outside, to live the life they talk about. But do they use the products they are trying to sell Ordinary Jo, or embrace the lifestyle they are promoting?
The other part of the multi-million dollar question is this: if you go into the grocery store, trying to be more environmentally aware and friendly, and you read product labels, does it make you mad when you find that two products, from the same company, have different labels but the exact same ingredients? Or did it make you mad because you simply fell for the hawkersī spiel in the commercial or ad?
Did you buy the product based on actually wanting to do the right thing, because the product really worked, or because of the good-looking guy selling it? Did you donate a weekīs worth of grocery money to the same guyīs charity because you truly believe they are doing good or because of someoneīs looks? Not many people donate to the causes of the rain forest when they see an ad featuring local natives, but when the charity gets someone like Jeff Corwin speaking for them, the donations skyrocket.
Not to make celebrity involvement in a cause out to be a totally bad thing, of course. People listen when their favorite celebrities speak, and if more people get on board because of it, then this is a case of everyone benefiting, even if those involved donīt quite understand all the implications of WHY itīs good. Due to the nature of the green movement—any change, no matter how small, is a help, as long as itīs the real McCoy—and thatīs where "buyer beware" and being an informed consumer comes into play.
Sure, we all NEED to start doing things that are more environmentally friendly. But we first need to start thinking about the reasons we arenīt doing something more then why we are. If you truly want to become more "green", change your ingredients. Make your ingredients different from everyone elseīs; donīt go buy a hybrid just because Leo DiCaprio drives one. If a hybrid will not do the job for you, donīt waste the money—just be more aware of the amount of driving and fossil fuels you use. Try to buy locally grown fruits and vegetables in order to become more locally sustainable in your community. Be more aware of your community and what is available in it.
Places like Trader Joeīs and Whole Foods certainly have organic locally grown foods, but with all the talk of "organic is better for you", the prices are also somewhere in the range of expensive to flat out unaffordable for most people. The fact that everyone is hollering for everyone to eat better, you would think the food that is better for you would be cheaper in order for you to buy it, but itīs not so.
Donīt buy organic cotton clothing because you think the guy in the ad is hot or your favorite celebrity wears it. Chances are they donīt and if you happen on them wearing one, they got it for free. Itīs called advertising, and it doesnīt cost the company very much to give away a few items here and there at celebrity events. In becoming more "green", we all need to become more aware of the real reasons why we need to be, if not for ourselves, for the children of the future.
Do people really care? Yes, they really care. People would love to be doing more, but for Ordinary Jo, most of doing good is just not affordable. The most important aspect of the environmental movement should not be to sell the change, but instead to INSPIRE the change. The rest will fall into place if consumers are vocal about what they want.
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