I attended a panel on Sustainable Consumer Products tonight at the GSB. There were a couple brand managers from Method, one from Clorox GreenWorks, and the Global Sustainability Lead from IDEO. Interesting discussion, with some surprising overlaps with our recent design projects in ME-313, one having to do with health attitudes and habits, and the other exploring energy efficiency in consumers.
While health, energy efficiency, and environmentally friendly cleaning products have some significant differences, there's an interesting correlation in the attitudes and behaviors of consumers. Much of what the panel discussed were familiar insights observed through our needfinding interviews on both projects.
For example, I was surprised to learn that Method chooses to attract consumers not by touting the environmental friendliness of their products, but rather, with sleek and sexy packaging design that "pops" on the store shelves and just begs a consumer to take a bottle home. Their goal is to design a bottle that looks so good, consumers will feel comfortable leaving it out on the counter all the time. Only over time, as the consumer becomes familiar and comfortable with the product does Method expect them to read the label and learn about how environmentally conscious Method is.
I thought this was a very significant point, and gets at the concept of creating a "head fake" for the consumer: convincing them to buy into a better product--in this case, environmentally--without them even knowing it. Do consumers actually need to understand and actively elect to behave in an environmentally friendly or a healthy way? Method would probably say No, and much of our needfinding insights would support this. If the end result is the desired behavior, why fight consumer resistance?
It was also interesting to hear about the obstacles faced in creating a "Green" line of products. "Green" has become a vastly overused term that places a number of preconceptions and ideas in consumers' minds. For example, with respect to cleaning products, Clorox had to battle the common perception that "green" = "less effective". It had become ingrained in consumers' minds that purchasing an environmentally friendly cleaning product meant sacrificing cleaning power, and Clorox had a difficult time combating this. Facing such an uphill battle, it was especially important for them to ensure that the GreenWorks line worked every bit as well as the rest of Clorox's lineup.
For the panel, "Green" was just another business proposition. They all took care not to overly promote this single aspect, at the risk of boxing themselves into a small and potentially constraining niche. For consumers, function and form still take first priority, and the "green-ness" of a product can not impact this. The speaker from IDEO brought up an interesting point to illustrate this -- a newly designed milk jug that greatly improves the environmental and financial aspects of the supply side of the milk business -- but failed to meet the basic demand of pouring easily (Good NY Times article here). Simply being environmentally friendly will never be enough to develop broad consumer appeal.
These were just a few of the points discussed, but one of my key takeaways was that consumers seem like very consistent creatures. Whether it's health, energy usage, or green cleaning products, consumers have a similar set of basic demands and needs, and it's critical that any effective solution meet these before attempting to modify any other behavior.
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