Abstract
Consumer brands are prioritising pro-environmental reputations in response to growing consumer concern. So- called green consumers are being targeted with buzzwords including sustainability, biodegradability, recycling and upcycling. Print advertising in South African media reflects this trend. This study mobilises a discursive taxonomy to examine particular dimensions of such advertising. The study interprets the findings thus extrapolated by suggesting a distinction between two types of green advertising: green branding and green washing in South African print media.
Highlights
AND RATIONALEIncreasing public anxiety over environmental degradation has stimulated demand for pro-environmental/green products
The eco label assigned by a third party provides a validating context that testifies to sustainable production methods, rather than the qualities of the product itself
The advertisement is designed to associate the brand and product with nature by claiming to draw inspiration from the natural world. This particular kind of image claim was coded under green washing as conceptualised in earlier sections, since it neither conforms to the definition of green branding nor of worthy cause advertising
Summary
Increasing public anxiety over environmental degradation has stimulated demand for pro-environmental/green products. This study treats such cases as instances of green washing, while conceptualising product and process claims as green branding, given their propensity for specific and empirically falsifiable information about a brand’s contribution to environmental care (Montage & Mukherjee 2010). Brands can employ a range of discursive strategies in an advertising campaign to construct a pro-environmental image (or style) through carefully selected representations of ecological concerns and the brand’s own contribution to alleviating these problems, as well as the behaviours that consumers are called on to exhibit. Marketing professionals are charged with applying this information to draw the audience’s attention, to engage them in the process of assigning meaning to an advertisement, and to commit specific claims to memory Fairclough refers to this process as the construction of consumer positions, which in turn includes the construction of value assumptions. Typical examples representative of these two categories (A: green branding and B: green washing) will be analysed
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