The Several Shades of Classic Green

If you're green — that is, if you're a green company, or marketing green products or services, or marketing to green customers — it's important to know just what green means.  In our last post, we showed that definitions of green differ in scope, from narrow to broad, and gave our own broad definition.  There are also different shades of green, differing in attitude. 

The classic breakdown comes from a 1990 Roper survey, nicely summarized by Jacquelyn Ottoman in her seminal work, Green Marketing (second edition, 1998).  The following, modified and condensed from her book, shows the "green spectrum" of the 1990s.

True Blues (or Deep Greens) — Hold strong environmental beliefs and live them. Believe they can personally make a difference in curing environmental ills.  Follow environmentally safe practices themselves and attempt to influence others to do the same.

According to Ottman, true blues (deep greens) come in three shades themselves.  (Her terms show how times have changed.  Health concerns are increasingly mainstream, as reflected by their growing presence in most supermarkets.)

Planet Passionates — Focus on issues relating to land, air, and water. They recycle bottles and cans, avoid overpackaged products, clean up bays and rivers, and boycott tropical hardwood.

Health Fanatics — Focus on the health dangers of environmental problems, such as cancer, genetic defects and tissue toxin buildup.

Animal Lovers — Protect animal rights. Boycott tuna and fur. Check to see if products are cruelty-free. Likely to be vegetarians.

Greenbacks — Willing to pay extra for environmentally preferable products.  Worry about the environment and support environmentalism, yet feel too busy to change their lifestyles.

Sprouts — Willing to engage in environmental activities from time to time but only when it requires little effort.  Rarely choose a green product if it is more expensive, and even then are willing to pay only slightly more.

Grousers — Do not believe that individuals play any significant part in protecting the environment. Feel the responsibility belongs to the government and large corporations. Will not pay more for green.  Comply grudgingly with environmental laws.  Feel that the environment is someone else's problem, so why bother.

Basic Browns — Not tuned in to the environment, and not convinced that environmental problems are all that serious.

That was the green spectrum one to two decades ago.  Since then, things have moved fast and far.  We are now in the early stages of an explosion of green awareness and concern, and while the shades outlined above still exist, the demographics and percentages of the 1990 Roper survey are obsolete.

Not only the demographics have changed.  Green itself has evolved conceptually, leading to important new shades of green.  We'll cover these in our next post.

Keith Borden, Consultant
Brilliant Green Marketing