Although greenwashing feels like an old topic, it’s still very much on the agenda. It’s becoming harder and harder to spot and avoid greenwashing as fast fashion brands are using techniques more and more sophisticated. Sometimes, it even feels like every fashion brand out there is greenwashing.

In this article, I’m sharing actionable tips to help you spot and avoid greenwashing. By the end you’ll be familiar with this multi-faceted concept and up to speed with the latest news regarding its regulation. For my personal take on this burning subject, real examples and honest conversations about being “greenwashed” by the fashion industry, head to Substack and become a member of the Slow Fashion Weekly newsletter.

What is greenwashing?

We use the term greenwashing to describe a situation when a company spends a lot of time and resources advertising themselves as “green” and “planet-friendly”. Meanwhile, they’re not engaged in the difficult and complex work of implementing sustainable changes within their organisation. 

They’re misleading customers into thinking their products are more sustainable or ethical than they actually are. Changes a company could implement, amongst many other things, include:

• Investigating their supply chain to eradicate unethical practices like child labour and auditing factories they work with regularly.
• Transitioning towards using more sustainable fabrics and phasing out synthetics like polyester.
• Seeking reliable and trustworthy certifications or third-party verifications like GOTS and B-Corp.
• Reducing water and energy consumption substantially in their business.
• Minimising waste during design and shipping.
• Setting up a sustainably managed take back program.
• Producing less or “on-demand”.

All of this work is costly and some of these changes are incompatible with a capitalist mindset. It also requires a lot of knowledge and expertise, which is still hard to come by. Finally, it is also less visible to the end consumer (i.e. us).

These are some of the reasons why some brands choose to implement minimal changes whilst communicating about it in a completely disproportionate matter. For example, a brand will use 20% organic cotton to make a 100% cotton denim piece. They’ll then launch a global marketing campaign, fronted by internationally-famous fashion influencers, to sell their new “sustainable” or “circular” jeans collection. 

Greenwashing and the environment

Why is greenwashing so bad?

Maybe you’ve heard that greenwashing is a necessary evil or that greenwashing can be good in “educating consumers” to buy better. That couldn’t be further from the truth. Greenwashing means a brand is still polluting the environment and exploiting garment workers on a daily-basis.

It’s particularly dangerous because more and more consumers are choosing products based on eco-credentials. Everyone wants to do good for the planet and some brands are exploiting this genuine concern for the environment. Consumers are being lured by aesthetically-pleasing marketing campaigns into feeling like they’re doing a good, ethical, thing by buying from “conscious” collections.

Is greenwashing illegal?

Greenwashing should be illegal to protect consumers, brands actually doing the work mentioned above, and to increase transparency in the fashion industry as a whole.

• Greenwashing in the UK: In October 2021, the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority announced the Green Claims Code. Brands making misleading or vague sustainability claims, claims that are not substantiated, that omit information, and that don’t take into consideration the entire life cycle of a product could, from January 2022, find themselves in breach of consumer protection laws.
• Greenwashing in Europe:  In March 2021, the EU approved the proposal for a directive on “mandatory human rights, environmental, and good governance due diligence”, meaning that, when it becomes legislation, companies will have to pay a penalty if they cause harm by not doing their due diligence. Companies including fashion brands will have to take responsibility for their entire supply chain making sure they’re preventing child labour, allowing freedom of association, and protecting biodiversity, among other things.

Source: What fashion got right in 2021, Dazed, 22.12.2021.

How to spot and avoid greenwashing when you’re shopping

10 very common greenwashing techniques

These technique are used by brands and their marketing departments to create misleading environmental claims. They’re often used together as you can see in the example below.

1. Fluffy language – the brand uses words that have no clear or official meaning like “eco-friendly”, “fair”, “conscious” and “green” to describe its products.
2. Green products versus dirty company – the brand sells a small collection of sustainable (or apparently sustainable) products but their overall production is still very polluting.
3. Suggestive pictures – the brand employs images of nature to indicate an (un-justified) green impact. Example: a beautiful flower display in the window of a fast fashion shop on Oxford street.
4. Irrelevant claims – the brand focuses all its marketing message on one green attribute when everything else is unsustainable. Example: “The content of this fast fashion polyester dress is partially recycled”.
5. Best in class – the brand says it’s more sustainable than other competitors, which are themselves amongst the worst polluters.
6. Just not credible – the brand exploits the lack of transparency in the fashion industry to make (almost) impossible claims.
7. Gobbledygook – the brand describes its products in a way that’s very difficult to understand using jargon or scientific terms in order to confuse the consumer and get away with not being actually ethical.
8. Imaginary friends – the brand mentions a third-party endorsement except it’s either made up or not reliable at all.
9. No proof – the brand doesn’t give any evidence to back up their claims such as figures, official certifications,…
10. Out-right lying – the brand gives evidence to back up their claims but it’s all made up or bent to fit their agenda.

A case study of greenwashing in action

Fast fashion brands produce at a massive scale to fill hundreds of stores, every week, on all four corners of the globe (and online) thus generating massive amounts of waste and pollution. 

This fast fashion brand, for example, owns over 5000 stores worldwide. There are 443 different items available to shop in the ‘Conscious’ collection, which is a lot. If you click on ‘New Arrivals’, you’ll be tempted with 701 new propositions that arrived this week. That’s greenwashing technique number 2.

Let’s take a look at this mint coloured fine-knit jumper to see what greenwashing looks like in action. In this example, the brand uses greenwashing technique number 1, 2, 4, 7 and 9. 

• Technique #1: the description says “containing some wool”. This mention is vague and misleading (i.e. ‘fluffy language’). Wool, even though is a natural material, isn’t necessarily sustainable. I’m adding one very good and short source of information if you want to read more about it. 
• Technique #2: the brand is advertising a supposedly green product (it isn’t) in an overall unsustainable company. One jumper couldn’t possibly make up for an overall shady production method and a huge turnover.
• Technique #4: there are irrelevant claims in this product description. Only half of the product is made of polyester (54%) so the fact that the “polyester content of this jumper is recycled” isn’t enough to make it sustainable. What about the other 46%? They were produced like every other non “conscious” jumper. 
• Technique #7: the brand hides information about the sustainability credentials of its products. To access more details about a product, we need to click on ‘product background’, which is a discrete link under the last picture. This is also a form of greenwashing as it dissuades the consumer to seek information properly. 
• Technique #9: there is no proof regarding this “recycled polyester” claim. No certification or third party endorsement, no data or additional information about what it’s recycled from. Why should we trust them?  

The ‘product background’ contains even more vague and misleading information. Firstly, none of it is relevant to this particular jumper. Secondly, the brand speaks in broad general terms and copy-paste the same bit of text on all its ‘conscious’ products.

Tips to help you avoid greenwashing

• It’s better to refrain from buying something new in the first place than having to recycle or sell it after a few wears. Only buying what really fits you and your personal style and choosing to invest in second-hand pieces are very sustainable shopping options.

• Look for 100% instead of mixed fabrics, such as 100% organic cotton rather than 50% organic or recycled cotton, 50% acrylic.

• ‘Eco-conscious’, ‘environmentally friendly’, ‘sustainable’ aren’t official certifications. There are reliable labels such as GOTS (Global Organic Textile Standard) and Fairtrade for example.  

• Vegan materials can be harmful to the environment. An oil-based faux leather or a wood-based viscose sourced from non sustainably managed forests aren’t sustainable. 

Your opinion

Have you been a victim of greenwashing? Share your experience below.

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