Sustainability is Not Your Competitive Advantage
by Sophie Lamont, Comms Planning Assistant
A little while ago, an email landed in my inbox: ‘OOH is the Most Sustainable Ad Platform for Brands’ declared the subject line. Needless to say, the sender was not a TV, Print or Radio supplier.
The claim was substantiated by a report from Outsmart, who self-describe as wanting to ‘make [OOH] a “must have” on every media plan.’ Alternative email header: ‘OOH industry marks own homework.’
I’d like to make it clear that by no means am I suggesting that the report is lying or the data fabricated, that OOH suppliers are not improving their sustainability credentials or that any other media channel is inherently ‘better’ for the environment.
But, as we hurtle evermore helplessly towards an irreversible climate crisis, a self-congratulatory claim to any kind of environmental superlative feels a little bit, well, icky. This isn’t an American High School Yearbook: ‘…and the award for Least Likely to Accelerate Environmental Disaster goes to…’ Not so catchy anymore.
Statements like that email header are distracting and misleading. Yes, media suppliers should show off how they are innovating to make their offering more sustainable (and should be held accountable to their promises). A competitive urgency to improve as quickly as possible – for good examples to inspire others – is a powerful force for change. But for any media channel to claim unambiguous superiority is too reductive; it tramples over any specificity required when making sustainable choices in media planning. It is not necessarily true that OOH (or any other media channel) will always be the ‘most sustainable ad platform’ for every brand in every campaign and so that email strayed towards greenwashing.
The need for sustainable solutions is just that: a need. Efforts to improve an organisation’s sustainability credentials should come from a sense of responsibility for its role in exacerbating or mitigating climate change, not as a sly bargaining tool to wave in the faces of environmentally conscious consumers (or, in the case of this frustrating email, media planners). It’s what’s right for the planet and human security and ought to be an area of unified co-operation, not a buzzword bandied around for competitive advantage.
This isn’t a game with winners; right now we’re all on the losing side.
