Big brands have ramped up sustainability marketing in a bid to cash in on the demand for ethical and climate-friendly fashion. Now regulators and consumers are putting these claims to the test.
Last week, the UK’s competition watchdog launched an investigation into sustainability claims made by fast fashion brands Boohoo, Asos and British supermarket chain Asda’s clothing label George, making fashion its first priority in efforts to address greenwashing concerns. In June, Norway’s Consumer Authority told outerwear brand Norrøna and Swedish fast-fashion giant H&M Group to stop using data from the widely used sustainability comparison tool, the Higg Index, on consumer labels, concluded that it may mislead consumers. The European Union is preparing a series of legislation aimed at curbing the influence of fashion and ensuring that any sustainable marketing is credible. And in the US, where regulators have been slower to move, a class-action lawsuit accusing H&M of “deceptive” sustainability marketing was filed in New York last month.
The moves represent a broad-based crackdown on greenwashing that is rapidly gaining momentum, bringing with it increased risks of reputational damage, litigation and censorship, and regulatory fines. Brands should pay close attention as these cases are likely to redefine how the industry can market its sustainability efforts.
“There’s no more smoke and mirrors in this,” said Kenneth Loo, co-founder and chief executive of communications firm Chapter 2 Agency. “You have to be transparent, and if you’re not, countries will force that transparency.”
BoF breaks down how brands should prepare.
Mind your language
Regulators are particularly focused on ambiguous language that could mislead consumers. For example, broad terms such as “green”, “sustainable” or “eco-friendly” commonly used in fashion marketing give the impression that products have positive environmental attributes. “If a business cannot prove this, it risks failing to meet its legal obligations,” the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority said in a new set of green marketing guidance published last year that forms the basis of of his current investigations into fashion brands.
“Brands need to articulate really, really clearly what they mean by sustainability,” said Whitney McGuire, co-founder of the intersectional sustainability initiative Sustainable Brooklyn and fashion advocate. “Their language should be much more precise.”
The CMA’s investigation into Boohoo, Asos and Asda focuses in part on the vague language the brands use to label their eco-friendly ranges, called ‘Future Ready’, ‘Responsibly Edited’ and ‘George for Good’ respectively. “. The CMA is examining whether such terms give consumers a false impression of the products’ true environmental impact. Among other things, the lawsuit against H&M alleges that the company has oversold its sustainability credentials by using terms like “conscious choice,” “sustainable materials” and “close the loop” when describing products and collections.
Boohoo, Asos and Asda said they were co-operating with the CMA in its investigation. H&M said it was taking the allegations seriously and was looking into them thoroughly.
Support it
To meet tough regulatory standards, brands must move beyond buzzwords and do more to substantiate their sustainability claims with robust and transparent information.
This will likely mean more work, as certification schemes and data sets commonly used in the industry, such as the Higg Index, themselves come under scrutiny.
“There needs to be reliable up-to-date evidence to show what you’re talking about,” said Samata Pattinson, chief executive of sustainable fashion consultancy RCGD Global. “A lot of people are drawn to the existing facts, which are almost being discredited as we discover more, so there has to be a willingness from companies, organizations and partners to invest in doing research and really being able to support them. claims”, she added.
This does not mean that every piece of sustainable marketing should be an essay, but important caveats or context should be made accessible. The CMA’s Code of Green Claims, for example, says that in some cases brands can include a link or QR code that provides further information – just make sure the finer details don’t conflict with the snappy slogan.
Ciara Cullen, a UK-based partner at law firm RPC recommends that her clients keep a file of all the data used to substantiate any claim, ideally accompanied by independent third-party verification and a confidential risk assessment before they are published.
When brands are communicating their sustainability efforts, every piece of data needs to be contextualized appropriately and carefully. For example, saying that a type of packaging contains 50 percent less plastic, or producing a certain pair of jeans that saves 20 liters of water, means little to the consumer without a baseline figure or point of comparison.
The risk of a disconnect can be exacerbated by the fact that different areas of a fashion business often have different — sometimes conflicting — objectives: A sustainability officer is charged with reducing a brand’s negative impact on the environment; A marketing or sales team, in contrast, is rewarded for driving growth and moving more product.
Cecilia Parker Aranha, director of consumer protection at the CMA, recommends that businesses train their staff to ensure “people speak the same language so you don’t end up in a situation where someone working on your sustainability team says, “We” retrying this fabric, which has a lower carbon footprint or a lower water footprint, and the marketing team runs away and says, “This is good for the environment.”
Think like a consumer
It’s definitely every fashion company’s dream to get inside the head of their target customer and understand what makes them tick so they can successfully sell more products. But brands can also benefit from another type of market research that asks: What do consumers know about sustainable fashion?
Current investigations of greenwashing mainly come down to the question of consumer perception, with regulators examining whether brands’ green claims can mislead shoppers and lead them to make misinformed decisions. Brands with a clear read on how consumers are reacting to their marketing can have a stronger defense. Boohoo said it surveyed over 1,400 customers on their thoughts on sustainable fashion in order to ensure that information in its marketing is clear and straightforward.
It is likely to become more important for brands to play a greater role in educating consumers about the influence of fashion. This also means providing more transparency about the challenges and limitations of any sustainability efforts.
“We’re immersed in this language of fashion sustainability and sometimes we think the consumer is too,” said Carrie Ellen Phillips of communications agency BPCM. “They are not.”
