Encouraging Consumer Choice

Communicating Background Stories of Responsibility

Many consumers today need to feel a connection with the environmental, social, and economical impacts of their foods, products, and packages. There is a great opportunity to encourage consumer awareness of how their food choices affect not only themselves, but also the global environment and society. For more on this example, visit www.backgroundstories.com.

By Arlene Birt and Fred Haberman

With increasing focus on sustainability, companies are eager to tell their customers how they are working to preserve the environment. At the same time, consumers are demanding transparency from companies.

Traditionally, eco-labels or similar "stamps of approval," have helped bridge communications between companies and consumers about environmentally friendly products. But as the movement toward sustainability picks up speed, an even more effective tool to clarify how products impact our surroundings is needed.

An array of green-marketing claims—organic, local, fair-trade, zero-emissions, carbon-neutral—have surfaced thanks to growing segmentation within the sustainability market. Unfortunately, this has caused confusion among consumers, especially since the sustainability of a product is often dependent upon its context.

New Leaf Paper quantifies their environmental sustainability with an "Environmental Benefits Statement" listing the savings in energy and resources. The chart calculates the savings of using post-consumer waste fiber vs. virgin fiber.
The Avril Lavigne CD booklet explains: Using 10,000 pounds of New Leaf Primavera Gloss, manufactured with electricity that is offset with Green-e ® certified renewable energy certificates, 80% recycled fiber and 40% post-consumer waste, and processed chlorine free saves the following resources:

• 48 fully grown trees
• 29,604 gallons of water
• 35 million BTUs of energy
• 2,376 pounds of solid waste
• 6,182 pounds of greenhouse gasses

Big picture connections between the products in consumers' hands and the outside world are required to communicate the sustainability of a product. Clearly, an evolution of the eco-label is needed to address the growing needs of the industry.

Background stories can help

Visual storytelling can arm consumers with the information they need to gauge the eco-worthiness of products. Revealing a product's social and environmental impact, Background Stories is a tool that visually describes the life cycle of a product—from production to the retail aisle—with graphics, facts and captions in a storyline.

Just as nutrition labels provide consistent information on food packaging, Background Stories note a product's carbon footprint and other Life Cycle Analysis (LCA) indicators. This framework can support existing product certification labels, such as organic and fair trade.

Unlike other labels, Background Stories have an extended life on the products' websites. Companies post data to back up claims they make on their packaging and consumers dig deeper into the manufacturers' business practices.

The environment, consumers, and businesses can all benefit from Background Stories. Consumers make choices that are healthier for themselves and the planet when provided with information about a product's environmental impact before purchasing it. In addition, companies no longer have to bury their sustainability stories in corporate social responsibility reports. Instead, they can present them at the point-of-sale.

Using the structure of storytelling—a familiar, engaging form of communication—Background Stories provides a foundation for consumers to navigate products' social and environmental information at their own pace, or not at all. Customizable for any product, the tool speaks to consumers in a positive way. Based on the facts consumers see on the label and online, decisions about what is right or wrong is left up to them.

The 360 Vodka brand is committed to sustainability from bottom to top in their "Close the Loop Program." The hang tag is a postage-paid envelope (folded into a square) for returning the closure. Not only do you recycle the closure, McCormick Distilling gives $1 to "recognized environmental causes" for every closure returned.
The glass bottle incorporates 85% recycled glass, 75% of which is post-consumer-recycled. The paper label is 100% post-consumer recycled eco-friendly paper sourced through the New Leaf Paper Co. The 360 Vodka's website, www.vodka360.com, features an "Eco-Glossary" and rolling "Eco-Factoids" that educate the consumer further.

Why the stories work

And a longer term impact holds even more promise. Companies that share their Background Stories with consumers will be better equipped to introduce innovative manufacturing and distribution practices that take a lesser toll on the environment. Soon, consumer demand for simpler, more accessible information on packaging will rise, causing companies to evaluate their sustainability practices and raise the bar in green reporting and action.

Finally, consumers who experience Background Stories on select products will be better educated about manufacturing and distribution processes and inclined to demand that environmental impacts be shared on products without Background Stories. Compared to other information sources, Background Stories allow companies to effectively communicate substantive information on their packaging. Where eco-labels mark single attributes, Background Stories put them in context.

Arlene Birt is a visual storyteller at Haberman & Associates, Modern Storytellers for Media + Marketing, a public relations and marketing agency dedicated to telling the stories of pioneers changing the way business is done or making the world a better place. She created Background Stories, her master's thesis, while studying in the Netherlands on a Fulbright grant. She can be reached through www.arlenebirt.com.

Fred Haberman is the cofounder and CEO of Haberman & Associates and specializes in brand and cause-related storytelling. He has counseled hundreds of companies on how to create emotional connections between their brands and their customers to generate brand awareness, sales, and positive change. He can be reached through www.modernstorytellers.com.