Thursday 11 September 2008

Anti-Green is in Vogue

The October issue of Vogue comes with a giant poster to advertise Marks and Spencer’s new range of autumn clothes. It is huge - about eight times A4 size. In between the photos of Lily Cole strutting about the countryside in tweed and cardigans, it also talks about M&S’s Plan A, which is its five year environmental plan to tackle ‘challenges facing our planet’ including raising awareness of eco issues and reducing carbon emissions.

So…a paper poster to talk about how ‘green’ the company is.

How can this have possibly seemed like a good idea?

It goes on to boast about all the planet-friendly things M&S has done so far including planting 20,000 tress to offset carbon emissions. But how many trees had to be cut down to create thousands of copies of this poster, which hardly anyone will read before throwing away? And how much carbon was wasted in producing it and transporting it? Shocking.

No comments: