Sustainability review platform, Wherefrom, is unimpressed by Mercedes’ Nature or Nothing campaign in which it associates the brand’s new electric vehicles with nature. So much so that it has created a campaign to call it out. Wherefrom and 10 Days London have created a rebuttal campaign that reimagines the Mercedes campaign with a reality check.
The creative rebuttal, created by 10 Days London, challenges the reality of the Mercedes campaign. The Mercedes campaign is eye-catching but it is a huge exaggeration, the partners say. Especially as Mercedes is currently being sued by the heads of non-profit environmental and consumer protection association, Deutsche Umwelthilfe (DUH), for not taking enough action to tackle their contribution to climate change (1).
George White, strategy director & co-founder at 10 Days, stated, “This is greenwashing 101 – equating Mercedes to the beauty of nature and leading consumers to believe Mercedes is a green company, which alas is not the case. They are a huge contributor to climate change. Creative agencies should take a hard look at themselves and take responsibility as the originators of the greenwashing ideas.”
In 10 Days’ response campaign, Nothing or Nature, the Mercedes posters have been altered to show a more realistic representation of Mercedes’ contribution to climate change. Instead of the beauty of nature, the campaign shows the actual effects of climate change – drought, flood and bushfire – to make people think twice about the use of green within advertising. The electrical storm image remains the same because it actually demonstrates the increased frequency of storms associated with climate change. Jolyon White, co-founder of 10 Days, commented. “It is moronic that this was even included in the first place.” Furthermore, the sub copy was changed from, The new electric vehicle generations it’s already here to climate change. It’s already here.
Greenwashing is still a substantial problem in the advertising industry. A recent European Commission report revealed 42% of companies’ “green” claims are exaggerated, false, or deceptive(2). Furthermore, according to the UK advertising watchdog, in the past 12 months, 16 advertising campaigns from household brands in the UK exaggerated their green credentials and were unable to substantiate them.
Companies and countries are slow on the uptake to change, so people are resorting to legal action in order to make them react more substantially to the problem. In fact, there has been a increase in litigation against companies not doing enough to tackle climate change – from 22 cases 2020, to 193 last year(3).
This is not the first time Wherefrom has taken an anti-greenwash stance. On Earth Day this year, Wherefrom launched Stop the Wash, a song containing over 100 slogans, using natural copyright to prevent corporations from using these slogans to Greenwash by threatening to sue them if they use any of the lyrics/slogans within the song.
Adam Williams, co-founder of Wherefrom, stated, “One of our reviewers contacted us via Stop the Wash. Transparency is extremely important and this is a clear case of greenwashing. We want to encourage any car manufacturer to be more transparent and not resort to greenwashing.”
(2) https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_21_269
