Sustainable Advertising and Publishing Supply Chains

[Carli]

Have you ever considered what the carbon footprint of an advertisement in a magazine or newspaper is... or for that matter the carbon footprint of a banner ad or email?

I am Senior Research Fellow with the nonprofit Institute for Sustainable Communication (ISC), a 501c3 organization dedicated to raising awareness and building capacity for the sustainable use of print and other communication media.

After years of lingering on the margins of advertising, climate change, sustainability and "green" topics have become a mainstream focus for advertisers and publishers. This has led to a bumper crop of new sustainable lifestyle publications, "eco" issues and special advertising supplements.

It is extremely positive that publishers and brand leaders have intensified their support for the creation of public service ads and editorial coverage to raise awareness about sustainability and encourage action addressing climate change. However, it is also likely that advertising and editorial coverage about sustainability will be seen as "greenwash" if brands fail to address climate change and sustainability in all aspects of their businesses, including the sustainability of their advertising media choices and the impacts attributable to their supply chain influence.

Correspondingly, it is likely that advertisers and publishers will increasingly be called upon to identify, quantify, offset and ultimately reduce the climate change impacts associated with their advertising related supply chain practices. Energy costs, energy supply, climate change, sustainable fiber sourcing and recycling are among the core issues that advertising and publishing supply chains will be required to address.

Advertising, publishing and printing represent hundreds of billions of dollars in economic activity that are essential to business, government and society at large. However, advertising and publishing supply chains also generate millions of tons of greenhouse gas emissions and waste associated with the production, distribution and fate of magazines, newspapers, freestanding inserts, direct mail, outdoor advertising and catalogs.

Neither print nor digital media advertising, as currently produced and managed, are sustainable... but they can be if advertisers and their supply chain partners work together. Advertising and publishing supply chains need to be reinvented if they are to be secure, sustainable and competitive in the face of rising energy costs, energy and petrochemical supply risks, population growth, climate change and challenges of sustainability.

In response, the Institute for Sustainable Communication (ISC) has formed The Sustainable Advertising Partnership, an inclusive non-partisan coalition of advertisers, publishers, ad agencies, printers, paper companies, retailers and other key stakeholders dedicated to fostering the widespread adoption of supply chain practices that address climate change and sustainability.

Organized as a project of the non-profit Institute for Sustainable Communication (ISC), the Sustainable Advertising Partnership works collaboratively with business, government, non-governmental organizations, and other stakeholders to promote the development, dissemination and use of information, tools, best practices, management resources and investments supporting the sustainable transformation of advertising and publishing supply chains.

I am interested in your questions, comments or suggestions about the Sustainable Advertising Partnership. For more information go to:

Sustainable Advertising Partnership

or contact me at:

dcarli@sustaincom.org

[Corey]

Here are a few examples of ways to reduce advertising waste.

1. Have a national registry of advertising that lets people pick what kind of advertising they want and they only get advertising for that. Get rid of "ALL advertising from magazines papers And all those annoying shopper adds and such. Most intelligent people actually never look at it.

2. Advertising in general is removed especially anything with excessive photos. Or limit photos to the product it self only with none of the hype or extra back ground. Also NO OVERSIZED PHOTOS Minimize the ink and packaging or extra paper that goes into providing the extra space for advertising!

3. Keep the text strictly about the product and "NO HYPE!" this will minimize the need for ink. or extra machining or what ever goes into making the ink wheel that does the printing.

4. Online advertising exactly how it is done on this site It is pure text that tells what its advertising with few words as possible.

5. any Electronic billboards that uses electricity to operate them "BAN" they are a waste of energy and resources when the people in the community completely ignore them.(At least I know I do.)

6. This is a start

[Johnny Electriglide]

I get green goods glossy mag ads in the mail a lot. High buck for feel good and actual green stuff (from mainly gaiam/realgoods). Glossy paper is harder to recycle, even if it is printed on recycled paper, it becomes trash. Advertising itself puts more expense on green items, making them less affordable for poor and "middle" income people who make up the bulk of the population. This computer is powered entirely by the sun, how many at, say microsoft, are powered by the sun or wind? How about the effect of the what the market will bear greed attitude on pricing of everything? Profiteering greed is rampant everywhere from organic foods, to program discs, to wind generators, and hybrid cars. The attitude of growth, growth, growth permeates manufacturing and advertising, which translates to more demands from an ever growing population. The whole thing is not only ecologically unsustainable, but immoral.

[Corey]

Have to agree with you there Johnny, especially taken into account that the items are manufactured before there are even buyers for it.

Consumers are like babies where the advertisement agency is the parent giving the baby junk food when the baby would prefer mashed carrots.

When will us consumers be treated like adults and allowed to make our own decisions without someone distorting info?

If Advertising was eliminated think of the energy and resources that would be saved in the advertising its self and the excess packaging to give a bigger surface for that advertising.