Consumers
November 01 2003
by Briefing StaffThe latest information on cause-related marketing from BITC not only shows continuing strong growth; it also reveals the genre is moving on from the days of 'tuppence to charity if you buy this product'. It is tackling a bigger range of issues and in more innovative ways with more in-kind contributions and by involving staff and customers more.
However the sums reported here are still small beer, whether compared to the total monetary amounts of corporate community contributions or in relation to the size of the actual social issues they are trying to address. One reason why CRM has not taken off big time is that marketing managers are too canny to take at face value these surveys - which people keep commissioning and we keep reporting - purportedly showing consumers will overwhelmingly switch to the ethical brand. They may say that, but they don't do it.
Consumer resistance to doing the right thing is dramatically demonstrated by Unilever UK's admission that it can't meet its fish sustainability target through market mechanisms alone. Right on cue comes a clutch of government or government-inspired studies about sustainable production and consumption (beware a new acronym to add to your CSR lexicon - SPC). In Briefing, we've previously argued that NGOs really shouldn't keep beating up on companies alone, without recognising that consumers are the real driving force.
Now a more sophisticated approach is emerging from these government studies, with practical ideas for all parties to address so-called market failures: things like better information for consumers through trustworthy labelling, using the tax system to include 'external' costs and create a level playing field, and stronger signals from government about increasingly tight environmental regulation so encouraging capital markets to invest in new products and new companies.
The government's SPC framework is well worth a read, but readers of Briefing will be disappointed that it is still so focused on environmental issues, albeit dressed up in the language of sustainability. There's little discussion of the impact that poverty has, for example, even in the affluent west, in driving unsustainable patterns of consumption. The language may be of triple bottom line, but they are still separate lines, with little thought to the role of business in creating the wealth that can fund social and environmental action.
The ultimate bottom line is clear, however: increased eco-efficiency is simply running to stand still - allowing us in the west to consume more without doing increased damage. Without fundamental changes in consumption patterns, we won't actually reverse the damage, still less allow the rest of the world to catch up. The ultimate cause-related marketing challenge? Persuading us to buy less.