Jacquie Ottman's
Green marketing Blog
2015: Fresh Ideas for Engaging Consumers in Preventing Waste
Posted on January 19, 2015 by Jacquelyn Ottman
(Image: Shutterstock)
What does it take to inspire people to ‘reduce’ and ‘reuse’ in addition to recycle? The top posts submitted during 2014 submitted by members of our growing We Hate to Waste.com global community showcase a number of brand new ideas for preventing precious resources from dead-ending in a landfill.
With recycling and composting stalled at 34% across the U.S., and incinerators back atop the agendas of many U.S. cities, the timing couldn’t be better for taking a fresh look at …Read more...
To Get the Last Drop, Consumers Look to New Innovative Gadgets
Posted on May 08, 2014 by Jacquelyn Ottman
What’s your favorite way to get at that last dollop of the Crest? Do you flatten as you go? Slice the neck? What about the shampoo or conditioner? Do you add a little water and swirl? Prop the bottle upside down in a corner? You are not alone! As the Wall Street Journal has noted, an increasing number of consumers are shaking, rattling and rolling their packages in search of the last drop, ounce and morsel …Read more...
Cultures Around the World Can Inspire No-Waste LIfestyles
Posted on April 24, 2014 by Jacquelyn Ottman
Lunches delivered to workers in India in steel tiffins. (Image: Letztrend.com)
Cultures around the world possess their own unique, deeply-ingrained beliefs and traditions for minimizing waste. For instance, the Yankee Ingenuity helped America put down its early roots, and the Dutch custom of sharing unlocked ‘community’ bikes at train stations inspired bike-sharing programs in NY, Paris and other world capitals. Many …Read more...
The Newest Rule of Green Marketing: Help Consumers Live a ‘No-Waste’ Lifestyle
Posted on April 11, 2014 by Jacquelyn Ottman
The Swedes Enjoy the Most Sustainable Lifestyle in the World (Image credit: Melker Dahlstrand/imagebnk.sweden.se)
In 1988, my antenna tweaked toward an emerging trend soon to be called ‘green consumerism’. A hole in the ozone layer was discovered over Antarctica, nightly newscasts tracked the daily wanderings of the Mobro garbage barge, and air pollution clogged views of the Grand Canyon. Among the culprits: consumer products.
Alternatives needed to be found for CFCs in aerosols, polystyrene clamshells …Read more...
Sustainable Innovation 2013: Key Lessons
Posted on December 05, 2013 by Jacquelyn Ottman
Every year I head to Europe to take part in the Sustainable Innovation Conference organized by The Centre for Sustainable Design (UK) as part of its ‘Towards Sustainable Product Design’ series of conferences. Sustainable Innovation brings together pioneers, movers and shakers from around the world and across multiple industries who are changing the game of sustainable design to present their ground-breaking concepts and ideas. This year’s program, as always …Read more...
Heineken Picks a Winner for Sustainable Packaging Challenge
Posted on July 25, 2012 by Jacquelyn Ottman
The jury has spoken. The winner of the Heineken Sustainable Packaging Challenge — and a $10,000 prize is Germany’s Helmut Wittele. His “The Heineken $1000 bottle” idea turns beer pong into a recycling game.
Wittele proposed an innovative “Heineken-O-Mat” device designed to motivate consumers to return/recycle bottles. Increasing the return rate of bottles and cans has a very positive effect on their environmental impact. This idea has the potential to engage all parties needed to make a real difference for Heineken, consumers, …Read more...
EPA’s Design for the Environment Label — A Route to Safer Chemicals
Posted on November 21, 2011 by Jacquelyn Ottman
Some chemicals are safer than others, and the U.S. EPA’s Office of Pollution Prevention and Toxics’s voluntary Design for the Environment label can help consumers identify all purpose cleaners, laundry detergents and oth
er products that have met performance measures and are known to contain the safest possible ingredients. Since its inception in 1997, the label has been earned by over 2700 products. (Full disclosure: DfE is a former client of mine.)
A product of EPA’s now twenty-year-old Design for the Environment (DfE) Program, the …Read more...
Running On Human Power
Posted on July 11, 2011 by Jacquelyn Ottman
While researchers are 
looking to the sun, the wind and even ocean tides to source renewable energy, some have found an answer much closer to home: the gym. This notion dawned on the owner of a string of gyms in Hong Kong, who rigged cycling and cross-training machines to power a gym’s lights and store extra energy in batteries for later use.
The Human Power Trainer, made by Windstream Power LLC of North Ferrisburg, Vermont, works on the same concept. It mounts a …Read more...
Method’s New Laundry Detergent—A Drop in the Bucket?
Posted on February 08, 2010 by Jacquelyn Ottman
Method deserves kudos for its new super-concentrated laundry detergent: 50 loads packed into a trim squirt bottle and 95% plant-based. Sounds great! A major achievement that should put Tide and Wisk on notice and turn heads at Wal-Mart. But let’s not let Dropps get lost in the hoopla.
Dropps, the product of a Philadelphia-based start-up, represents what may be an even greater achievement in source reduction. Eschewing the concept of dispensing with detergent from a bulky plastic jug, 20 dissolvable detergent capsules (“dropps”) come packed in a collapsible plastic pouch. …Read more...
Opportunities for Marketing to the Green Consumer
Posted on January 09, 2010 by Jacquelyn Ottman
Consumers buy over $200 billion of natural personal care and cleaning products, organic produce, hybrid cars, fair trade coffee, compostable plates and cups, and other green products and services.
Please join me on February 4, 2010 (in New York City) for Opportunities to Market to the Green Consumer. Network with members of the Columbia Business School Alumni Club and other senior marketing professionals from New York. Listen to green marketing practitioners from HSBC, Ozocar and Sundance Channel talk about opportunities to build green brands, innovate new products and services, and …Read more...
Hey, Nestle: Don’t Communicate—Eco-Innovate!
Posted on November 20, 2008 by Jacquelyn Ottman
If only Nestle had used good green marketing efforts and communicated its efforts to green its bottled water business sooner, it wouldn’t be in the mess it’s in now. Right? Wrong!
Contrary to what Kim Jeffery, CEO of Nestle Waters, laments to BusinessWeek, the real issue with bottled water lies in consumers’ minds (and the advocates who influence them), not in pricey carbon analyses showing that lightweighting the plastic bottle is the solution to reducing the environmental impact of bottled water. The real issue simply …Read more...
Apples Versus Oranges: To Compare or Not?
Posted on October 14, 2008 by Jacquelyn Ottman
I received an email this morning from a frantic manufacturer of laptops: "We need to finalize a green marketing claim for an ad we're preparing. Our laptops use less energy than desktop computers. Should we make the claim? Help! We don't want to be accused of greenwash!" (Note: Company name not included and category has been changed for confidentiality - but you'll get my points!)
On the surface a comparative green marketing claim such as this one looks pretty innocuous. However, dig a little deeper and you find some issues.
Read more...
Is There a gDiaper in Your Baby’s Future?
Posted on July 31, 2008 by assistant
Can anyone topple the disposable diaper giants? The makers of gDiapers promise an attractive, well fitting, convenient diaper that can be flushed, home composted or tossed. All parents want a diaper that is easy to dispose of, safe, absorbent, and affordable. Can gDiapers provide all of this with less load on the planet? Let’s see how the facts stack up.
Diaper Facts: Sustainable vs. Conventional
There’s no doubt that disposables are the easiest to use. All you do is undo the plastic …Read more...
Déjà Vu All Over Again - Part II
Posted on July 22, 2008 by Jacquelyn Ottman
Last month I discussed some of the green marketing missteps that we keep repeating no matter how many times we should have learned from hard experience that such tactics fall short. I suggested that rather than repeating these mistakes, perhaps the best solution is to move forward with new product innovations that truly transcend green marketing claims and eco-labels.
In fact, pursuing a course of eco-innovation - new product concepts with the potential for significantly enhanced consumer benefits and significantly reduced environmental impact - might be just what the …Read more...
Controlling Interest
Posted on July 22, 2008 by Jacquelyn Ottman
Consumers' desire to control a world that's increasingly viewed as spinning out of control lies at the heart of green marketing. If they didn't feel that greener products made a difference, there would be no market for organic produce, non-toxic cleaners, or Energy Star-qualified appliances.
Getting Your Consumer to 'Bite': Green Marketing Strategies
Empower your consumers with messages that underscore the difference they make as one consumer or in concert with all the other …Read more...
