Are you surprised?
Consumers show a varied appetite for green.
Go ahead and look closely. You might be inclined to count. Which brand appears the most times in the ImagePower 2009 survey of Top Green Brands? It’s IKEA! The Swedish furniture retailer is followed closely by Microsoft (that’s right) and the personal care brands Dove (P&G) and Nivea (Beiersdorf).
There are some other interesting tidbits in these results. First is that for each country, the type of brand that is perceived as green is quite different. In China, the green brands are dominated by information technology companies. In the UK, it is food retailing and personal care. In the US, there is a bit of a mixed bag, but it seems that Clorox, with it’s Green Works and Burt’s Bees lines, takes the top prize. There are some other companies that have made a whole lot of green noise that don’t seem to be hitting the mark.
Without revealing the entire contents of the report, it is also interesting to note that “at least 77 percent of consumers in all countries say it’s somewhat or very important” for companies to be green. “However, in the US, 77 percent of consumers communicated deeper concern for the economy than the environment, which is unchanged from 2008.” You can draw your own conclusions from those remarks.
It seems to me that the key take away is to recognize that the green message needs to be tailored for the specific needs of the geographic market. What plays in Peoria might not play as well in Pudong.