While reading the CRS Report for Congress Global Climate Change: Three Policy Perspectives I came across something that was somewhat intriguing to me. Here is an excerpt:
“It is not necessary for consumers to change their behavior significantly to adjust to the “new reality” of an environmental problem.
What this is basically stating is that basically it will take little effort for the consumer to adapt to a greener product line. HOWEVER, I was taken aback by this. While a consumer has no problem adapting to say more energy efficient lightbulbs or a arsenic free Macbook Pro, they will not necessarily do so.
The "green" Macbook Pros.
However, companies need to make these things affordable and unfortunately they do not. The way it is projected to me as a consumer is that because big business is taking steps to make things greener it is your responsibility to cover those changes we had to make to our product line.
Primary example: while shopping for a dish sponge at Wal-Mart I had the choice of choosing a two-pack sponge for .99 or a sponge made from bamboo for 9.99. It was admirable for the company to offer an alternative, but it is not feasible at such a high price.
Another prime example, the Macbook Pros above. While Apple was able to turn their Pro computer line to a highly recyclable product with a small footprint it comes at a premium (as a user of one of these it is hard for me to criticize). Without sounding like one of those Laptop Hunter Microsoft ads you can get a computer that is equivalent for half the cost. So instead of sending 3,000.00 for a computer that will leave a smaller footprint, most consumers will look for the same speced laptop (sans operating system) for 2/3 the cost.
So the lens that consumers are looking for are affordability. Consumers don’t necessarily have to look hard to find “green” products–it is the “it” campaign to be involved with at the moment(sorry for the Bruno reference). But at the same time the consumer needs to be educated what “being green” actually is. We are exposed to tons of adverts from Madison Ave. talking about being green and what companies are doing to make their footprint smaller but most of us are looking at it through a translucent lens. Within those ads, advertising firms or PSAs need to be more efficient when talking about for example making the switch to CF bulbs.
While being green is sensible and of course is a good thing paying a high premium puts extra financial strain on families.
What should happen? Companies should lower prices–obviously easier said then done. If something is reusable–a company has to supplement the price of say a sponge or a lightbulb because consumers won’t be buying that often. It is a conundrum but as the sustainability catches on perhaps we will see a decrease in production costs.
Now I leave you with a “green” ad from Apple…
