Evaluating the green advertisingpractices of international firms:

a trend analysisLeonidas C. Leonidou

University of Cyprus, Nicosia, Cyprus, and

Constantinos N. Leonidou, Dayananda Palihawadana andMagnus Hultman

Leeds University Business School, University of Leeds, Leeds, UK

Abstract

Purpose – Consumer scepticism about the credibility of green advertising around the world isgrowing. The article aims to provide a comprehensive assessment and trend analysis of greenadvertising practices of international firms over a 20-year period.Design/methodology/approach – The study identifies 473 international green advertisementsduring the 1988-2007 period and content-analyses them on five major axes: advertiser profile, targetingfeatures, message aspects, copy characteristics, and situation points.Findings – The content analysis reveals significant trends in all major areas examined and identifiesimportant interaction effects between certain dimensions of green advertisements.Research limitations/implications – The findings could be augmented by combining them withchanges in the external environment, input from consumers about advertising effectiveness, the viewsof advertisers and advertising agencies, and secondary data referring to the performance of thespecific company/product advertised.Originality/value – Green advertising research mainly focuses on domestic rather than internationaladvertisements; examines important issues in isolation from other issues; partially analyses message,copy, and situation characteristics; and covers a short period. This study fills these gaps bysystematically evaluating international green advertisements over a long period and using anintegrated framework of analysis that is based on the extant literature. It also explores potentialinteraction effects between key dimensions describing these advertisements.

Keywords Green marketing, Advertising, Environmental management, International marketing

Paper type Research paper

IntroductionIntensifying environmental regulations by governments and other bodies, growingpressures on organizations by stakeholder groups to preserve the environment, andrising concern of the general public about the harmful effects of certain industrypractices on the ecology are issues responsible for the phenomenal increase worldwidein the number of firms adopting environmentally friendly approaches in their sourcing,operating, and marketing activities (Gurau and Ranchhod, 2005; Menon and Menon,1997; Polonsky and Rosenberger, 2001; Sriram and Forman, 1993). Advertising playsa critical role in communicating this pro-environmental image while harnessing aneco-friendly consciousness among consumers and organizations (Grillo et al., 2008;Iyer and Banerjee, 1993). Recent evidence has shown that green advertising has grownexponentially in the last two decades (Futerra, 2008), becoming the driving forcebehind increasing public awareness of ecological issues and skyrocketing demand foreco-friendly goods (Easterling et al., 1996; Polonsky et al., 1997).

Despite the benefits offered, green advertising activity has run into major problems,with people in many countries becoming increasingly sceptical about its credibility,

The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available atwww.emeraldinsight.com/0265-1335.htm

International Marketing ReviewVol. 28 No. 1, 2011pp. 6-33r Emerald Group Publishing Limited0265-1335DOI 10.1108/02651331111107080

Received January 2010Revised June 2010Accepted August 2010

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validity, and usefulness (Pfanner, 2008). Some of the reasons causing this scepticismcan be attributed to the growing number of companies promoting their environmentalcredentials, the increasing buyer complaints to various watchdog organizations(e.g. European Advertising Standards Alliance, the US Federal Trade Commission)about misleading claims (Knight, 2008), and consumer concerns about the way manygreen-themed advertisements are made and presented.

Numerous studies have been conducted to understand the nature, structure, andcontent of green advertising, making this a field of environmental marketing researchof its own (Leonidou and Leonidou, 2011). Although it provides useful insights foradvertisers, advertising agencies, public policymakers, and other interested parties,this body of research suffers from various gaps: first, the majority of investigationshave had a domestic emphasis, despite the growing importance of internationalgreen advertisements as a result of intensifying globalization trends; second, theapproach to evaluating environmental advertisements has been fragmented, withimportant issues being investigated in isolation from others; third, the message, copy,and situation characteristics of green advertisements have been partially and/orinadequately examined; and fourth, in most cases, environmental advertisements havebeen evaluated at a specific point in time (or covered over a short period of time), thuspreventing temporal trends from being established.

This study aims to fill these gaps, by systematically providing a comprehensiveassessment and trend analysis of green advertising practice by international firmsover a 20-year period. It specifically attempts to provide answers to the followingquestions: What are the profile characteristics of firms engaged in international greenadvertising? What are the targeting features of their advertisements, in terms ofproducts, audience, focus, and level of greenness? What types of environmental claimsare conveyed in the messages, and how are these assessed from a specificity, emphasis,and validity perspective? What are the structure and format of the headlines used, andwhat is the specific mode and tone of the body copy? What forms of settings andpresenters are employed in illustrations, and what types of identification marks areshown? Lastly, are there any interaction effects between key dimensions describinginternational green advertisements?

We have organized the remainder of this article as follows: We first review theliterature on green advertising and discuss the key issues. Then, we explain themethodology adopted to carry out the study, focusing on the scope of research,sampling frame, research instrument, coding process, and analytical method. Next, wepresent and discuss the findings of the study with regard to each of the researchquestions – namely, advertiser profile, targeting features, message aspects, copycharacteristics, situation points, and interaction effects. In the next section, wesummarize the key insights of the study and draw conclusions. In the final sections,we discuss the managerial implications and provide future research directions.

Review of green advertising literatureEnvironmental (or green) advertisements refer to all appeals that include ecological,environmental sustainability, or nature-friendly messages that target the needs anddesires of environmentally concerned stakeholders (Zinkhan and Carlson, 1995). Thesefall under three major categories:

(1) those that directly or indirectly address the relationship between a product/service and the natural environment;

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(2) those that promote an environmentally responsible lifestyle with or withouthighlighting a product/service; and

(3) those that present an image of corporate environmental responsibility(Banerjee et al., 1995).

Some of the green advertisements have an educational content (e.g. helpingstakeholders understand the nature of environmental issues), others are purelycommercial in nature (e.g. inducing people to buy the company’s products and becomeregular customers), and still others are image-focused (e.g. enhancing the firm’s greenprofile) (Banerjee et al., 1995; Menon et al., 1999). Corporations wanting to support theirdomestic and international environmental marketing strategies widely use greenadvertising, regardless of its content (Belz and Peattie, 2009).

The first environmental advertisements appeared in the late 1960s, when thescientific community, public opinion, and consumer activism raised the first concernsabout the anti-ecological practices many firms followed at that time (Easterling et al.,1996). In response to these concerns, firms used advertising as a means to promote anenvironmentally friendly approach in their business to customers, regulators, andother stakeholders (Kinnear and Taylor, 1973; Peattie, 1995). However, it was not untilthe late 1980s that green advertising experienced a sharp increase, mainly becauseof heightened public awareness and concern, spiralling competitive pressures, andstricter government regulations related to the environment (Carlson et al., 1996;Kilbourne, 2004). False advertising claims, exaggerated green messages, and consumerconfusion regarding green terminologies were some of the reasons for the decrease ofgreen advertising activity in the 1990s (Easterling et al., 1996; Polonsky et al., 1997).This negative climate begun to turn around at the dawn of the new millennium, whenstrong global political support, sound international legislative developments, andrenewed public interest worldwide propelled marketing strategies into a new“sustainable” era (Belz and Peattie, 2009; Yin and Ma, 2009).

These developments in green advertising practice attracted the attention of manymarketing scholars who followed various streams of research (Leonidou and Leonidou,2011). The first is green washing, which pertains to the validity and deceptiveness ofenvironmental advertisements (Kangun et al., 1991; Karna et al., 2001; Newell et al.,1998). In this context, green advertisements fall under four categories:

(1) ambiguous, containing statements or phrases that are too broad to have a clearmeaning;

(2) omission, excluding important information to evaluate its truthfulness orreasonableness;

(3) false/lying, including claims that are clearly untrue or misleading; and

(4) acceptable, making specific environmental claims in a justifiable,self-explanatory, and clear way (Kangun et al., 1991).

In general, studies focusing on green washing revealed some degree of misleadingnessor deception in the advertisements examined (Kangun et al., 1991; Carlson et al., 1993;Karna et al., 2001), indicating a serious problem in the advertising industry inaccurately portraying and promoting the environmental credentials of firms.

Another stream of research focused on environmental claims, which Carlsonet al. (1993) classify as product-oriented, process-oriented, image-oriented, and

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environmental fact. Studies belonging to this research stream found thatimage-oriented claims were used most frequently but, at the same time, were themost ambiguous, while product claims, though popular, were the most deceptive. Inaddition, Easterling et al. (1996) reported that different types of approaches havebeen used to communicate environmental messages over time, with image-orientedand process-related claims used in the early years of environmentalism andproduct-oriented claims used in recent years. However, contradictory resultswere found for claims of a factual nature, with some studies (e.g. Carlson et al.,1993) revealing widespread use, and others (e.g. Easterling et al., 1996) indicatingminimal usage.

Advertising greenness, which measures the level of environmental informationincluded in advertisements, was the object of another group of researchers. In termsof greenness, Banerjee et al. (1995) grouped environmental advertisements intothe following categories: shallow, moderate, and deep. This classification wassubsequently augmented with additional levels of greenness, such as thefive-dimensional typology that Wagner and Hansen (2002), Kilbourne (1995), andGrillo et al. (2008) adopted. Most studies revealed that advertising claims hadmainly a shallow or moderate greenness, denoting a lack of substantiveness,comprehensiveness, and credibility. In contrast, advertisements that contained deepenvironmental claims were mainly characterized by high effectiveness in conveyingtheir messages (Manrai et al., 1997).

Another group of studies (e.g. D’Souza and Taghian, 2005; Schuhwerk andLefkoff-Hagius, 1995) investigated the effect of environmental advertising messageson consumer behaviour. Several contradictions have been observed in this line ofresearch. For example, Newell et al. (1998) found that consumer perceptions of greenclaim deception did not have an effect on advertiser credibility, attitudes towardthe advertisement/brand, and purchase intent; and according to Chan et al. (2006),substantive environmental claims for high-involvement services were more effectivethan associative environmental claims. Two other studies tried to ascertain the roleof green-based consumer involvement with regard to green claim effectiveness,evaluation, and consequences. However, while Schuhwerk and Lefkoff-Hagius (1995)found that only low environmentally involved consumers were positively affected bygreen appeals, D’Souza and Taghian (2005) revealed the opposite.

The examination of copy and situation aspects of environmental advertisementsprovided another stream of research. With regard to copy aspects, evidence showsthat there was a shift in the language used over time (e.g. Banerjee et al., 1995; Iyerand Banerjee, 1993; Wagner and Hansen, 2002). For example, early advertisementson the subject highlighted such ecological terms as “disposable”, “recyclable”, and“pre-packaged”; however, these have been gradually replaced by more contemporarywords such as “organic”, “energy efficient”, and “sustainably sourced” (Peattie, 1995).Although green advertisements can have different tones of expression, ranging fromrational and emotional to moral and zeitgeist (Banerjee et al., 1995), rational appeals(particularly those promoting self-interest rather than social conscience) were foundmore suitable (Fiori, 1989). With regard to situation points, various elements have beenused to improve the comprehensiveness of the green advertising message (Grillo et al.,2008). Some examples include environmental-related setting graphics (e.g. naturalwildlife), nature-related presenters (e.g. animals), and green identification marks (e.g.green logotypes or certification labels) (Banerjee et al., 1995; Karna et al., 2001; Wagnerand Hansen, 2002).

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Finally, although many international corporations have extensively usedadvertising to communicate their environmental practices to the global market, onlya few studies focused on international green advertising. Carlson et al. (1996) andPolonsky et al. (1997) were the first to investigate green advertising claims in aninternational context, by comparing environmental advertising practices in the UnitedStates, Canada, Great Britain, and Australia. Their findings revealed significantdifferences in green advertisements among the four countries, with US advertisementscharacterized by fewer environmental and more associative claims. Another group ofscholars examined the role of the country of origin in influencing the effectiveness ofenvironmental claims. Their findings confirmed that the ecological reputation of theproduct’s country source (Chan, 2000; Chan et al., 2006) and the product’s country-of-origin predisposition (Chan and Lau, 2004; Manrai et al., 1997) were important inmaximizing the effectiveness of green claims. Surprisingly, other key green advertisingissues examined in a domestic domain remained relatively untapped.

Study methodWe confined our study to environmental/green advertisements that had aninternational focus, that is, advertisements with environmental messages targetingaudiences located in more than one country (Douglas and Craig, 2002). We identifiedthese advertisements from the international edition of The Economist, a widelyread publication focusing on business, economics, and political issues, with aweekly circulation of more than one million copies. The magazine is also a globaladvertising outlet, covering almost all countries in the world, with the USAaccounting for half of all subscribers. Altogether, the study covered 944 magazineissues published during the 1988-2007 period, a sufficiently lengthy time to establishtrends on the evolution of international green advertising. Owing to the exploratorynature of the study, we placed no limitations on selecting the advertisements interms of type of advertiser, nature of the products advertised, or the advertisement’starget audience.

Two specially trained researchers independently searched all issues of the magazinefor the 20-year period. To trace any advertisements with an ecological flair, thefollowing steps were taken:

(1) the two researchers received definitions of green advertisements derived fromthe pertinent environmental marketing literature;

(2) examples of international advertisements containing green claims wereprovided to understand their nature;

(3) a list of keywords such as “environmental”, “ecological”, “sustainable”,“natural”, and “green”, were employed to facilitate the identification of relevantadvertisements;

(4) the major ecological problems that marked the world since the early 1970s(e.g. global warming, animal extinction) were briefly analysed; and

(5) the most frequent technical terms used in relation to environmental issues(e.g. carbon dioxide, chlorofluorocarbon, methane) were explained.

Of the 33,349 advertisements scanned, the two researchers identified 557 and 523advertisements, respectively, with an environmental focus. A comparison of the twosets of advertisements revealed that only 431 were the same; this represents a

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consistency level of approximately 80 percent[1]. The remaining advertisementswere discussed with the principal investigator to agree on including another 42advertisements relevant to the study. This resulted in a final sample that comprised473 different green advertisements.

Notably, the annual frequency of the green advertisements did not follow a clearpattern during the period of investigation (see Figure 1). That is, at the beginning of thestudy period, the number of these advertisements was relatively high (reaching 58 in1990), but in subsequent years it dropped to low levels (falling to six in 2002). However,in recent years there has again been a growth of ecological advertisements (rising to48 in 2006). These “ups and downs” in international green advertising activity greatlyreflect various worldwide events related to environmental issues[2]. From theadvertising pattern, we divided our sample for analytical purposes into three periods:1988-1994 (220 advertisements), 1995-2001 (68 advertisements), and 2002-2007 (186advertisements).

We used content analysis to evaluate each of the advertisements collected(Abernathy and Franke, 1996). To codify the information contained in eachadvertisement, we designed a special coding protocol, comprising five major sections:advertiser’s profile (i.e. company name, location country, organization type, andeconomic activity); targeting features (i.e. products advertised, target audience, productcycle, and level of greenness); message aspects (i.e. type of environmental claim, claimspecificity, claim emphasis, and claim validity); copy characteristics (i.e. headlinestructure, headline format, body copy mode, and body copy tone); and situation points(i.e. illustration setting, illustration presenter, company identification mark, andproduct identification mark).

The coding protocol contained constructs and items that other scholars have usedmainly in the field of advertising in general and green advertising in particular.As such, to a large extent, the protocol was heavily structured, though the option“other” was also available for some constructs to identify hidden issues that priorresearch has not tackled on the subject. To make the protocol more comprehensive

0

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1988

Years

Num

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of a

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men

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Source: The Economist (January 1988-December 2007)

2007

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1999

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1991

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1989

Figure 1.Frequency of international

green advertisementsby year

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and provide a common frame of reference in coding the advertisements, we prepared aspecial manual that incorporated operational definitions, explanations, and examplesfor each construct/item. Before the full-scale coding process, we tested the codingprotocol using a small sample of advertisements; this revealed only minor correctionsto improve its workability.

The two researchers who previously identified the green advertisements, undertookthe coding, under the supervision of the principal investigator. The coders hadappropriate educational levels, experiential background, and familiarity with thesubject. Both coders underwent rigorous training, in which the general purposeand objectives of the coding exercise were clarified; the constructs and items includedin the coding manual were analysed, and the way the coding protocol needed to beadministered was fully explained. Coders also participated in a short coding exerciseto ensure that the process was clearly understood. After training, each coder receivedthe full set of advertisements and transferred the information contained in eachindependently onto coding forms.

With the completion of the coding task, each coder returned all completed formsto the principal investigator, who subsequently carried out an inter-coder reliabilityanalysis (Holsti, 1969). This analysis revealed a satisfactory level of agreement in thetwo coding attempts, ranging from 91 percent for some items (e.g. advertisinggreenness) to 100 percent for others (e.g. advertiser characteristics). The principalinvestigator and the two coders discussed and collectively resolved the codingdisagreements and, in some ambivalent cases, the opinion of an expert in the fieldwas sought. The data contained in the final coding forms were subsequently enteredfor statistical analysis, including total percentage frequencies, partial percentagefrequencies, chi-square (w2) test, and post hoc tests because of the nominal nature of thedata collected.

Research findingsIn this section, we discuss the study’s findings in terms of each research objective—namely, advertiser profile, targeting features, message aspects, copy characteristics, andsituation points. To better understand the changes in these advertising dimensions overtime, the Appendix (Table AI) provides a list of the key events related to environmentalissues that took place worldwide during the investigation period. At the end of thesection, we discuss the interaction effects between the advertising dimensions examined.

Advertiser profileA total of 195 firms were the sponsors behind the 473 advertisements identified,with the top ten companies being responsible for 38.3 percent of them (see Table I).These top green advertisers were as follows: Shell (7.0 percent), ABB (5.7 percent),BP (5.3 percent), Bayer (4.2 percent), TOTAL (3.4 percent), Degussa (3.2 percent),BASF (3.0 percent), General Electric (2.1 percent), Chevron (2.1 percent), and Opel(2.1 percent). Top advertisers, as well as most of the other firms in the sample, typicallyhandle products that greatly depend on natural resources and/or whose consumptionseriously affects the environment. Notably, the green advertising pattern variedsignificantly by period, with ABB (w2¼ 21.42, p¼ 0.000), BASF (w2¼ 27.19, p¼ 0.000),and Shell (w2¼ 13.92, p¼ 0.001) holding the leading positions in the periods 1988-1994,1995-2001, and 2002-2007, respectively. With a few exceptions, this reflects a ratherreactive approach to green advertising, often driven by situation-specific factors. Forexample, the excessive amount of Degussa’s advertisements in the late 1990s could be

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Time period

Advertiser profile

Total

(n¼ 473)%

(I)

1988-1994

(n1¼ 219)%

(II)

1995-2001

(n2¼ 68)%

(III)

2002-2007

(n3¼ 186)% w2 p-value Scheffe’s test

Company name

Shell 7.0 2.3 10.3 10.8 13.92 0.001 IIXI, IIIXI

Asea Brown Boveri (ABB) 5.7 11.0 2.9 0.5 21.42 0.000 IXII, IXIII

BP 5.3 4.1 1.5 8.1 5.45 0.066

Bayer 4.2 5.5 10.3 0.5 13.28 0.001 IIXIII, IXIII

TOTAL 3.4 0.9 1.5 7.0 12.25 0.002 IIIXI

Degussa 3.2 2.3 13.2 0.5 27.19 0.000 IIXI, IIXIII

BASF 3.0 3.7 2.9 2.2 0.79 0.673

General electric 2.3 – – 5.9 17.38 0.000 IIIXII, IIIXI

Chevron 2.1 – – 5.4 15.76 0.000 IIIXI

Opel 2.1 3.7 2.9 – 6.75 0.034 IXIII

Siemens 2.1 4.1 1.5 – 8.34 0.015 IXIII

Lexus 1.9 – – 4.9 14.17 0.001 IIIXI

Volvo 1.9 4.1 – – 10.64 0.005 IXIII

Other 55.8 58.3 53.0 54.2 1.16 0.560

Location country

Germany 20.7 27.3 35.3 7.6 34.45 0.000 IIXIII, IXIII

United Kingdom 16.1 13.2 13.2 20.4 4.69 0.094

United States 13.3 6.8 8.8 22.6 22.95 0.000 IIIXII, IIIXI

Switzerland 9.7 15.1 11.8 2.7 17.94 0.000 IIXIII, IXIII

Japan 9.7 6.8 11.8 12.4 3.86 0.145

The Netherlands 8.2 6.4 4.4 11.8 5.47 0.065

France 7.0 5.0 2.9 10.8 7.08 0.029 IIIXII, IIIXI

Sweden 5.5 9.1 1.5 2.7 10.52 0.005 IXII, IIIXI

Italy 2.3 1.8 – 3.8 3.55 0.169

Other 7.5 8.5 10.3 5.2 2.16 0.340

Organization type

Manufacturer 93.4 95.4 94.1 90.8 3.49 0.174

Supplier 19.0 16.4 – 29.0 29.02 0.000 IXII, IIIXII, IIIXI

Distributor 2.1 1.8 – 3.2 2.68 0.264

Financial organization 2.5 2.2 1.5 2.1 1.14 0.567

Governmental

organization 1.9 0.4 – 4.3 9.50 0.009 IIIXI

Non-profit organization 1.1 0.4 2.9 1.1 3.06 0.216

Other 0.2 – – 0.5 1.55 0.462

Economic activity

Industrial goods

production 81.0 80.4 91.2 77.9 5.75 0.057 IIXI, IIXIII

Consumer goods

production 33.2 31.1 58.9 26.9 19.64 0.000 IIXI, IIXIII

Services 19.9 23.3 8.8 19.9 6.82 0.033 IXII, IIIXII

Mining 16.5 12.3 1.5 26.9 28.45 0.000 IXII, IIIXII, IIIXI

Agriculture 6.3 10.9 1.4 2.7 14.76 0.001 IXII, IXIII

Table I.Advertiser profile of

international greenadvertisements

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attributed to the firm’s adoption of new environmental strategies and the introductionof sound environmental management systems.

Almost all green advertisements examined were sponsored by firms located inthe developed parts of the world, particularly Europe, the United States, and Japan.In total, nine countries (among the most economically advanced) accounted for 92.5percent of the green advertisements examined. Overall, German firms had the leadingposition with 20.7 percent of the advertisements, followed by British (16.1 percent), US(13.3 percent), Swiss (9.7 percent), and Japanese (9.7 percent) companies. However,the frequency of green advertising differed markedly by country: Germany(w2¼ 34.45, p¼ 0.000) and Switzerland (w2¼ 17.94, p¼ 0.000) were in the lead duringthe 1988-1994 period, but their advertising activity dropped sharply in the2002-2007 period. The reverse trend occurred in the case of the United Kingdom(w2¼ 4.69, p¼ 0.094) and the USA (w2¼ 22.95, p¼ 0.000), which in the last periodwere the most frequent green advertisers. This change in the green advertising scenecould reflect increasing demands by local and regional stakeholders for moreenvironmental initiatives, as well as international criticism received by US and Britishfirms for not conforming to environmental standards (Polonsky et al., 1997). Thesame holds true for Japanese companies, which have also tried to enhance their greenimage recently.

The overwhelming majority (93.4 percent) of the sponsors of green advertisementswere manufacturing firms, which took the lead throughout the investigation period.This can be justified because these firms are more likely to damage the environmentthrough their resource use (e.g. energy consumption), production processes (e.g. toxicemissions), or the products they manufacture (e.g. non-biodegradable). Suppliers ofraw materials composed the second major advertising group, accounting for 19.0percent of the total advertisements. Again, the activities of these firms have a directimpact on the environment, especially regarding the extraction of non-renewableraw materials and the environmental pollution caused by processing them. Greenadvertising activity by other types of firms was minimal, and this aimed primarilytoward communicating the green character of some of their services, as in the caseof financial organizations offering risk assessment of environmental projects tocorporate clients. Green advertisements sponsored by either government or non-profitorganizations were almost non-existent. In rare cases, these advertisements wereusually aimed at raising public concern on environmental problems.

Most of the firms involved in green advertising were big conglomerateorganizations, consisting of multiple strategic business units and producing a widerange of products. Approximately, four-fifths (81.0 percent) of the advertiserswere engaged in the production of industrial goods (e.g. chemicals), and anotherthird (33.2 percent) were manufacturers of products directed to the consumer market(e.g. automobiles). These are basically firms with products that have often beenaccused of harmfully affecting the environment. Organizations belonging to theservices sector accounted for one-fifth (19.9 percent) of the advertisements, whosefocus was on communicating their environment-led services and/or sensitizing peopleto the potential consequences of ecological problems. Firms related to the mining andagricultural sectors had the smallest share, being responsible for 16.5 and 6.3 percentof the advertisements, respectively. However, while advertising activity by miningcompanies was more evident in the period 2002-2007 (w2¼ 28.45, p¼ 0.000), the reversewas true for agricultural-related firms, which advertised more during the first period(w2¼ 14.76, p¼ 0.001).

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Targeting featuresThe most frequent products appearing in green advertisements were energy-related(e.g. gas, oil, and electricity) (23.3 percent), followed by transportation equipment(e.g. automobiles, airplanes, and trains) (12.5 percent) (see Table II). Advertisementsfrom both categories were more evident during the 2002-2007 period (representing32.8 and 16.1 percent of the total, respectively). Advertisements focusing on metalproducts, machinery, and non-metallic goods accounted for 9.5 percent of the total andwere mainly shown during the early stages of the investigation period (w2¼ 23.17,p¼ 0.000). Two other categories that also attracted attention, albeit to a lesser extent,pertained to renewable technology and environment-related services. Other productcategories were advertised on a much more limited basis, though some notablevariations existed in their advertising pattern. For example, business services wereadvertised more in the first period (w2¼ 9.10, p¼ 0.001), chemicals and plastic products

Time period

Targeting feature

Total

(n¼ 473)%

(I)

1988-1994

(n1¼ 219)%

(II)

1995-2001

(n2¼ 68)%

(III)

2002-2007

(n3¼ 186)% w2 p-value Scheffe’s test

Products advertised

Electricity/oil/gas/fuel/energy 23.3 19.6 8.8 32.8 19.03 0.000 IXII, IIIXII, IIIXI

Automobiles/airplanes/trains 12.5 11.4 5.9 16.1 5.21 0.074

Metal products/machinery/

non-metallic 9.5 13.7 17.6 1.6 23.17 0.000 IIXIII, IXIII

Renewable technology 8.7 5.5 5.9 13.4 8.83 0.012 IIIXI

Environment-related services 6.3 5.5 8.8 6.5 0.98 0.612

Chemicals/plastic products 5.1 5.9 10.3 2.2 7.49 0.024 IIXIII

Business services 4.7 7.8 2.9 1.6 9.10 0.011 IXIII

Agriculture/forestry/fishing 4.4 5.5 7.4 2.2 4.22 0.121

Public administration/public

services 1.9 – – 4.8 14.16 0.001 IIIXI

Paper products/printing

and publishing 1.7 2.7 2.9 – 5.29 0.071

Mining 1.5 0.5 4.4 1.6 5.60 0.061

Waterworks and supply 1.5 0.5 1.5 2.7 3.44 0.179

Miscellaneous 18.9 21.4 23.6 14.5 4.19 0.123

Target audience

Business-to-consumer 42.9 32.9 30.9 59.1 33.01 0.000 IIIXII, IIIXI

Business-to-business 36.7 42.0 48.5 25.8 16.28 0.000 IIXIII, IXIII

Both 20.4 24.6 20.6 15.1 5.74 0.057

Product-cycle

Consumption-related 60.0 52.1 57.4 70.4 14.40 0.001 IIIXI

Production-related 28.6 38.8 32.4 15.1 28.40 0.000 IIXIII, IXIII

Both 11.4 9.1 10.3 14.5 2.98 0.225

Degree of greenness

Deep 41.9 38.8 38.2 46.8 3.05 0.218

Moderate 29.4 26.5 27.9 33.3 2.35 0.308

Shallow 28.7 34.7 33.9 19.9 11.77 0.003 IIXIII, IXIII

Table II.Targeting features of

international greenadvertisements

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in the second (w2¼ 7.49, p¼ 0.024), and public administration/public services in thethird (w2¼ 14.16, p¼ 0.001).

More than two-fifths (42.9 percent) of the advertisements focused on consumers,while 36.7 percent targeted business buyers. However, while during the initial yearsof the period under investigation the emphasis was on the business market (w2¼ 16.28,p¼ 0.000), more recent advertisements placed greater emphasis on consumer buyers(w2¼ 33.01, p¼ 0.000). That is, 59.1 percent of the advertisements published duringthe 2002-2007 period targeted consumers, compared with 25.8 percent with abusiness-to-business orientation. To some extent, this can be explained by theincreasing awareness of ecological issues by consumers in many countries (particularlyin the developed part of the world) and the concomitant escalation of demand forenvironmentally friendly versions of products and services (The Cooperative Bank,2007). Another one-fifth (20.4 percent) of the advertisements targeted both consumersand businesses, and this was particularly true for products related to energy,chemicals, and electronics. This dual focus, though relatively high in the initial years,consistently diminished over time (w2¼ 5.74, p¼ 0.057).

About three-fifths (60.6 percent) of the advertisements stressed the consumptionside of the advertiser’s products, focusing on ecological attributes related to the use ofproducts/services (e.g. recycling, energy savings); in contrast, 28.6 percent highlightedproduction-related issues such as ecological friendliness aspects of production inputsand processes (e.g. advanced ecologically friendly technology, sustainable rawmaterials, and environmental expert advice on processes). However, while the formergroup of advertisements experienced an upward trend over time (w2¼ 14.40, p¼ 0.001),the reverse was true for the latter (w2¼ 28.40, p¼ 0.000). The remainder (10.5 percent)emphasized both consumption and production elements.

We employed Banerjee et al.’s (1995) categorization to determine the degree to whicha green advertisement explicitly states the environmental behaviour of the advertiser.Of the advertisements examined, 41.9 percent were considered “deep”, that is, providedextensive hints about the firm’s environmental practices (e.g. statistical figuresindicating environmental efficiency improvement). Another 29.4 percent had“moderate” greenness, that is, did not focus on topics related to the environmentper se, but rather mentioned specific issues (e.g. a description of recycling methodsor corporate environmental actions). The remaining 28.7 percent displayed “shallow”greenness, that is, made general inferences to environmental attributes and initiatives(e.g. mentioning products’ biodegradability properties without further explanation).Advertising greenness demonstrated a gradual increase over time, with “deep”advertisements constituting almost half (46.8 percent) of those that appeared in the2002-2007 period. To some extent, this mirrors the growing pressures stakeholdergroups in many countries put on firms to show proof of their environment-protectionpractices.

Message aspectsFollowing Carlson et al. (1993), we classified environmental claims contained inadvertising messages into four major categories: product-oriented, process-oriented,image-oriented, and environmental fact (see Table III). Product-oriented claims,which focus on the eco-friendly characteristics of the product advertised, appearedin more than half (52.2 percent) the advertisements. Some examples included lowproduct emissions, product durability, low energy consumption, and product recycling.Process-oriented claims, which are related to the company’s green internal technology

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and production methods, were identified in just 26.6 percent of the advertisements.These claims included emphasis on low toxic emissions, low energy use, andnon-polluting production processes. Image-oriented claims such as preserving theecosystem, maintaining natural resources, and reducing the greenhouse effect,were less common. Finally, claims related to environmental facts such as stressing theissue of increasing levels of global warming, were the least employed.

With regard to the specificity of environmental claims, 62.3 percent of theadvertisements made specific claims (i.e. claims with a clear meaning, usuallyaccompanied by detailed information). A case in point is the following claim madeby the energy company ENEL in 2005: “We are working to reduce CO2 emissions tozero. In the last five years we have already reduced them by 17 percent”. The remainingadvertisements made vague claims (i.e. phrases too broad to have a distinct meaning)such as “we respect the environment”, “environmentally sound”, and “ecologicallyfriendly”. Notably, the proportion of advertisements incorporating specific claimsincreased dramatically over time, from 53.9 percent in 1988-1994 to 73.0 percent in2002-2007.

More than half the advertisements had a strong claim emphasis – that is,environment-related issues were highlighted as of primary significance, in contrastto traditional benefit-creating attributes (Manrai et al., 1997). For example, Toyota’s“zero emission advertisement” in 2007 announced to the public its environmentalbeliefs, incentives, and targets for the future, without, however, referring to any otherattribute. We observed weak emphasis on environmental aspects in the remainder ofadvertisements (i.e. 43.9 percent), and these typically presented environmental

Time period

Message aspect

Total

(n¼ 473)%

(I)

1988-1994

(n1¼ 219)%

(II)

1995-2001

(n2¼ 68)%

(III)

2002-2007

(n3¼ 186)% w2 p-value Scheffe’s test

Claim type

Product-oriented 52.2 50.2 45.6 57.0 3.24 0.198

Process-oriented 26.6 32.4 7.4 26.9 16.69 0.000 IXII, IIIXII

Image-oriented 14.2 17.4 17.6 9.1 6.37 0.041 IIXIII, IXIII

Environmental

fact-based 10.4 8.2 4.4 15.1 8.09 0.018 IIIXII, IIIXI

Claim specificity

Specific 62.3 53.9 60.3 73.0 15.07 0.001 IIIXI

Vague 37.7 46.1 39.7 27.0 15.07 0.001 IXIII

Claim emphasis

Strong 56.1 46.1 47.1 65.5 13.76 0.001 IIIXII, IIIXI

Weak 43.9 53.9 52.9 33.5 13.76 0.001 IIXIII, IXIII

Claim validity

Acceptable 58.6 49.3 61.8 68.3 15.24 0.000 IIIXI

Ambiguous 30.2 37.4 33.8 20.4 14.29 0.001 IIXIII, IXIII

Omission 8.0 12.8 4.4 3.8 12.49 0.002 IXIII

False/lie 3.2 0.5 – 7.5 18.97 0.000 IIIXII, IIIXI

Table III.Message aspects ofinternational green

advertisements

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practices

friendliness as an extra minor attribute influencing the product/service value offer.For example, in a 1990 advertisement, Volvo revealed the benefits of buying its760 series, which, in addition to greater safety, enhanced comfort, and improvedtechnology, offered environmental friendliness. In terms of claim emphasis, weobserved that advertisements published at the beginning of the examination periodhad a predominantly weak claim emphasis (w2¼ 13.76, p¼ 0.001), while in lateradvertisements, emphasis on environmental aspects became increasingly stronger(w2¼ 13.76, p¼ 0.001).

We evaluated the validity of the environmental claims made using Kangunet al.’s (1991) quadruple typology: acceptable, i.e. advertisements with no falseclaims or omissions; ambiguous, i.e. allegations that do not have a distinct meaning;omission, i.e. statements that omit details that are important to verify whether theyare true; and false/lying, i.e. inaccurate or untruthful declarations. Of these,acceptable claims accounted for 58.6 percent of the advertisements, followed byambiguous claims (30.2 percent of the advertisements). Claims characterized byomissions or false/lying appeared in 8.0 and 3.2 percent of the advertisements,respectively. Advertisements increasingly incorporated acceptable claims in theirmessages (w2¼ 15.24, p¼ 0.000), rather than ambiguous and omission claims,which experienced a downward trend (w2¼ 14.29, p¼ 0.001; w2¼ 12.49, p¼ 0.002,respectively). Our assessment also revealed an increase in false/lying claims,which reached 7.6 percent during the 2002-2007 period (w2¼ 18.97, p¼ 0.000), whichis in line with findings of an event report recently produced by the British AdvertisingStandards Authority (2008). To some extent, this finding is attributed to someautomobile manufacturers reporting that their cars were environmentally friendlywhen, in reality, they were not and even exceeded average acceptable industrystandards.

Copy characteristicsThe most commonly employed headline (and subheading) structure in theadvertisements had a declarative form (75.7 percent); that is, they provided astatement with a definite meaning such as “we have a plan to combat climate change”(see Table IV). Headlines with identification (i.e. a clear distinction of the advertiserand/or its products), or interrogative (i.e. words questioning in a challenging sequence)structure appeared in 18.6 and 17.1 percent of the advertisements, respectively. Just6.6 percent of the advertisements employed slogans (e.g. Bayer’s “expertise withresponsibility”). Some advertisements also used statistics in their headlines as a meansof dramatizing the consequences of ecological problems. Other types of headlinestructure such as quotation, selective, and negative, were rarely used. A trend weobserved here is the reduced use of identification headlines (w2¼ 7.85, p¼ 0.020) andslogans (w2¼ 6.90, p¼ 0.032).

The informative headline (and subheading) was the most frequently used format(84.4 percent of the advertisements), and was consistently high across the entireinvestigation period. Degussa’s (1999) headline, “working together to protect theenvironment”, provides a good example in this respect. Next (12.3 percent of theadvertisements) were headlines that stressed the environmentally friendly nature ofthe product’s features (e.g. LEXUS’s (2006) advertisement “the world’s firstperformance hybrid sedan”), though their use experienced a declining trend (w2¼13.58, p¼ 0.001). We recorded a news format in only 5.7 percent of the advertisements,and this mainly took the form of announcing recent environment-related developments

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in the company and/or its products. Other types of headline format such asconsultative, feelings, and testimonial, were also infrequently used.

Body copy appeared in many different modes, with half (50.1 percent) theadvertisements giving a description of key issues that might linger in the reader’smind (e.g. “Do you see a tree? At Veolia we see an industrial challenge”). This wasclosely followed by an explanation mode (47.8 percent of the advertisements), whichmainly provided details about environmental problems unknown to the reader, aswell as information about the environmentally friendly character of the companyand its products. For example, a General Electric advertisement in 2005 argues that“by developing advanced technologies in energy, manufacturing, and infrastructure,

Time period

Copy

characteristic

Total

(n¼ 473)%

(I)

1988-1994

(n1¼ 219)%

(II)

1995-2001

(n2¼ 68)%

(III)

2002-2007

(n3¼ 186)% w2 p-value Scheffe’s test

Headline/subheading structure

Declarative 75.7 73.5 72.0 79.6 2.57 0.276

Identification 18.6 23.7 17.6 12.9 7.85 0.020 IXIII

Interrogative 17.1 13.7 19.1 20.4 3.43 0.180

Slogan 6.6 7.7 11.7 3.2 6.90 0.032 IIXIII, IXIII

Statistics 4.2 3.7 5.9 4.3 0.64 0.726

Quotation 2.3 3.6 1.5 1.1 3.20 0.202

Selective 1.9 2.7 1.5 1.1 1.57 0.456

Negative 1.7 1.8 1.5 1.6 0.05 0.975

No heading/

subheading 3.4 4.1 2.9 2.7 0.67 0.716

Headline/subheading format

Informative 84.4 80.8 92.6 85.5 5.79 0.055

Product feature 12.3 16.4 17.6 5.4 13.58 0.001 IIXIII, IXIII

News 5.7 7.3 1.5 5.4 3.35 0.188

Consultative 3.8 3.7 1.5 4.8 1.57 0.456

Feelings 3.8 5.9 5.9 0.5 8.94 0.011 IIXIII, IXIII

Testimonial 2.3 1.4 – 4.3 5.70 0.058

No heading/

subheading 2.5 3.1 – 2.7 2.17 0.338

Body copy mode

Description 50.1 28.7 45.6 76.9 93.78 0.000 IIXI, IIIXII, IIIXI

Explanation 47.8 70.3 47.0 21.5 96.07 0.000 IXII, IIXIII, IXIII

Technical

expertise 39.5 56.2 27.9 24.2 47.47 0.000 IXII, IXIII

Factual 37.0 41.1 48.5 28.0 11.98 0.003 IIXIII, IXIII

Persuasive 26.2 23.7 23.5 30.1 2.40 0.301

Statistics 26.0 17.8 13.2 40.3 33.23 0.000 IIIXII, IIIXI

Other 1.3 1.8 – 1.1 1.47 0.479

Body copy tone

Rational 99.7 100.0 97.0 99.4 0.69 0.710

Emotional 34.2 37.9 26.5 32.8 3.30 0.192

Ethical/moral 29.4 31.5 25.0 28.5 1.18 0.555

Table IV.Copy characteristics of

international greenadvertisements

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practices

we can create solutions that are as economically advantageous as they are ecologicallysound”. Technical expertise was employed in two-fifths of the advertisements, mainlyto demonstrate the company’s ability to protect the environment such as “we havethe know-how to biologically treat your waste water”. Another 37.0 percent of theadvertisements had a factual mode – that is, they provided various facts that enhancedthe ecological profile of the advertiser. Advertisements used persuasion (e.g. Dupont’sadvertisement in 1990 saying that “Tynek is easily recycled or disposed of, withno adverse environmental effects”) or statistics (e.g. “at YARA we are geared to reduceour emissions by 25 percent before 2008”) less frequently. Some notable tendenciesregarding body copy modes are the increasing adoption of description (w2¼ 93.78,p¼ 0.000) and statistics (w2¼ 33.23, p¼ 0.000) and the declining use of explanation(w2¼ 96.07, p¼ 0.000), technical expertise (w2¼ 47.47, p¼ 0.000), and facts (w2¼ 11.98,p¼ 0.003).

Regarding body copy tone, the overwhelming majority of the advertisements(99.7 percent) were characterized by a rational approach. This mainly took the form ofdeclarative comments about the direct benefits the company’s methods and productscontributed to the environment (e.g. “TOTAL was the first oil company to produceand market biofuels”) and, to a lesser extent, their efficiency (e.g. “since 1992, Chevronhas reduced its own energy consumption by 24 percent”) or quality (e.g. “BP’s ultimatefuels help vehicles deliver more performance and less pollution”) aspects. Anemotional tone was employed in 34.2 percent of the advertisements, and this usuallystressed either pleasure (e.g. “Toyota Prius delivers impressive environmentalperformance and driving pleasure”), or pride (e.g. “the latest Shell report allowsyou to judge how far we have come”). Other emotional appeals, though less popular,derived from fantasy, warmth, fear, happiness, and guilt. Only 29.4 percent ofthe advertisements had an ethical/moral tone, which typically took a positive stanceas to what is moral, ethical, or right. A case in point is Linde Group’s advertisementin 2006, which states that “we take our products from nature and that’s why we have aparticular responsibility toward the environment”.

Situation pointsThe green advertisements also used a wide range of illustrations. Advertisementsshowing a natural environment represented 27.9 percent of the total, though a seriousdecline occurred during the 2002-2007 period (w2¼ 27.32, p¼ 0.000) (see Table V). Somepopular scenes here included a blue sky, a tree in a field, a blue sea, a green forest, andflowers or birds. Still life illustrations, which presented mainly pictures of products(e.g. cars, airplanes, machine equipment), appeared in 13.9 percent advertisements andwere more evident in the last two periods (w2¼ 7.97, p¼ 0.019). In about the sameproportion, advertisements also employed imaginary or artificial scenes as in the caseof Vattenfall’s advertisement, which shows a lion hunting penguins in a dried-up,tropical region, were also employed in about the same proportion. Approximately, 12.6percent of the advertisements adopted an industrial environment setting, particularlyin the case of advertisers producing heavy industrial goods. Some advertisements alsoopted to show exclusively green equipment/devices (e.g. water desalination devices),green lifestyles (e.g. a father fishing with his child in clean river waters), andenvironmental objects (e.g. plastic bottles or aluminium containers).

More than half (57.5 percent) the advertisements did not include a presenter in theirillustrations. Of the remainder, the presence of ordinary people was the most common,often shown individually or in association with other people with similar

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IMR28,1

characteristics (e.g. men, women, children). Animals constituted the second-largestcategory, shown in 9.5 percent of the advertisements, and their presence was thehighest during the 1988-1994 period (w2¼ 11.97, p¼ 0.003). Altogether, 40 differentanimals appeared in advertisements, with mammals comprising the biggest group (19),

Time period

Situation point

Total

(n¼ 473)%

(I)

1988-1994

(n1¼ 219)%

(II)

1995-2001

(n2¼ 68)%

(III)

2002-2007

(n3¼ 186)% w2 p-value Scheffe’s test

Illustration setting

Natural environment 27.9 36.5 36.7 14.5 27.32 0.000 IIXIII, IXIII

Still life 13.9 9.1 19.1 17.7 7.97 0.019 IIXI, IIIXI

Imaginary/artificial

environment 13.7 15.0 10.3 13.4 1.02 0.600

Industrial environment 12.6 16.0 11.8 9.1 4.31 0.116

Normal scenery 11.6 8.2 22.0 11.8 9.68 0.008 IIXI, IIXIII

Abstract design 9.5 9.1 13.2 8.6 1.31 0.519

Green equipment/device 6.7 10.5 – 4.8 10.88 0.004 IXII, IXIII

Slice of life 5.7 5.4 4.4 6.5 0.43 0.809

Green lifestyle 3.4 2.2 1.4 5.4 3.83 0.147

Environmental objects 1.1 1.4 – 1.1 0.93 0.628

Other 3.0 4.6 – 2.2 4.47 0.107

No setting 5.9 2.7 – 11.8 19.91 0.000 IIIXII, IIIXI

Illustration presenter

Normal people 21.8 16.0 33.8 24.2 10.75 0.005 IIXI, IIIXI

Animals 9.5 14.2 1.5 7.0 11.97 0.003 IXII, IXIII

Company person 5.7 4.6 1.5 8.6 5.69 0.058

Special character 2.7 3.2 5.9 1.1 4.61 0.100 IIXIII

Expert 1.3 0.9 4.4 0.5 6.38 0.041 IIXIII

Human hands 1.3 1.8 – 1.1 1.47 0.479

Special people 0.6 0.5 – 1.1 1.12 0.572

Celebrity 0.4 0.4 – 0.5 2.57 0.277

Cartoon 0.4 – – 1.1 3.10 0.212

No presenter 57.5 58.4 52.9 58.1 1.11 0.575

Company identification mark

Environmental website 24.7 6.8 29.4 44.1 75.84 0.000 IIXI, IIIXII, IIIXI

Environmental slogan 8.8 10.0 – 10.8 7.80 0.020 IXII, IIIXII

Green signature cut 1.3 2.3 – 0.5 3.47 0.177

Green logotype 0.8 1.4 – 0.5 1.51 0.470

Green awards 0.3 – – 0.5 1.55 0.462

No company environmental

identification 66.6 79.9 70.6 49.5 41.08 0.000 IIXIII, IXIII

Product identification mark

Legal requirements logos 2.3 0.5 – 5.4 12.61 0.002 IIIXII, IIIXI

Environmental certification 2.1 1.4 – 3.8 4.50 0.105

Green trademark 0.2 – 1.4 – 5.97 0.051

No product environmental

identification 95.4 98.1 98.6 90.8 13.94 0.001 IIXIII, IXIII

Table V.Situation points ofinternational green

advertisements

21

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practices

followed by birds (nine), insects (six), amphibians (three), and fish (three). The mostfrequently shown animals were ducks, trout, and butterflies, each appearing in threedifferent advertisements. A company person appeared in 5.7 percent of theadvertisements; this person usually had the status of a top executive, engineer, orscientist within the organization. A small proportion of advertisements introducedspecial characters such as Opel’s teddy bear, which appeared in a 1992 advertisementthat showed the bear as the only thing left after cars are recycled. Experts were rarelyshown, and if so, they aimed to confirm the firm’s commitment to save the environmentor emphasized the firm’s environmental expertise.

Two-thirds (66.6 percent) of the advertisements contained no identification markassociated with the green status of the company. Of those that did, the most commonlyused was an “environmental website”, which provided additional information aboutthe firm’s environmental practices and educated consumers on environmental matters.As expected, the use of environmental websites was more prevalent in more recentadvertisements (due to the emergence of the Internet as a communication mediumin the late 1990s). Environmental slogans such as BP’s “beyond petroleum”, AEG’s“our future demands responsibility”, and Boeing’s “making airport communitiesquieter communities”, appeared in just 8.8 percent of the advertisements. Other formsof identification marks such as the green signature cut (e.g. Waste ManagementEurope), green logotype (e.g. the black-and-white panda above the WWF sign), andgreen awards (e.g. Rolex laureate award for people making exceptional contributions tothe environment) were rare.

The use of green product identification marks was even more infrequent amongthe advertisements examined, with only 4.6 percent displaying such marks. Legalenvironmental logos, indicating that the product met minimum required industrystandards, appeared in just 2.3 percent of the advertisements. These advertisementswere mainly sponsored by automobile firms, which have recently been obliged toprovide more information about their cars’ CO2 emissions. Environmental certificationappeared in 2.1 percent of the advertisements, the most commonly cited being ISO9002, Energy Star, and Energy Efficiency Scheme (later renamed Carbon TrustStandard). Finally, the use of green trademarks (i.e. company signs symbolizingan environmental aspect) appeared in only one advertisement, namely that ofSANYO in 1995, which shows the planet earth with a mark indicating the eco-friendlynature of the firm’s refrigerators. The negligible use of green trademarks can beattributed to the newness of this phenomenon in the last few years and, though manyfirms now widely embrace these trademarks, usually some time must elapse beforelegislative bodies approve them and firms subsequently include them inadvertisements.

Interaction effectsIn addition to identifying differences in international green advertisements overtime, we focus on specific interaction effects among the key issues examined. Withregard to advertiser profile, we found that some companies adopted distinctiveenvironmental patterns that deviated from the norm. For example, BP and Bayershowed greater sensitivity toward environmental issues by making more specific,strong, and acceptable claims than the other firms examined. In addition, internationalcompanies from the UK or USA tended to have greener advertisements thanthose based in other countries, probably reflecting their stricter environmentalregulations.

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IMR28,1

We also found differences in environmental advertisements in the case oftargeting features. For example, while automobiles/airplanes/trains, chemicals/plastic products, and paper products/printing and publishing had vaguer and moreambiguous green advertisements, the opposite was true for renewable technology andenvironmental-related services. Our analysis also found that the greener theadvertisement, the stronger, more specific, and more acceptable the ecologicalclaim made.

With regard to message aspects, the greener the advertisement, the more evidentwas the use of environmental claims, regardless of whether this pertained to a product,a process, an image, or an environmental fact. In terms of the products advertised,we observed some variations in the type of claim used. For example, automobilemanufacturers placed greater emphasis on product-oriented claims, environmentallyrelated services used more process-oriented claims, agriculture/forestry/fishingorganizations used more image-oriented claims, while energy firms mainlyemployed environmental fact-based claims. The analysis also indicated that weakenvironmental claims were vaguer than those with a strong emphasis and highspecificity. Claim validity was also significantly associated with the specificity andemphasis of the claim: acceptable claims were more prevalent in advertisementswith high specificity and strong emphasis, while claims with more ambiguity,omissions, and falsehoods/lies were mainly connected with advertisements withgreater vagueness and weaker emphasis.

In the case of copy characteristics, headlines/subheadings containing declaration,identification, or statistics were associated more with automobiles, waterworks andsupply, and energy, respectively. Our analysis also indicated certain distinctivepatterns with regard to headline format: while the use of “testimonials” was morecommon in advertisements with deep greenness and high specificity/strength,the reverse was true with regard to “news”. Advertisements with factual andpersuasive body copy were related more to strong, specific, and acceptable claims.Finally, the deeper the greenness of the advertisement, the more ethical the body copytone was.

With regard to situation points, illustration settings exhibiting naturalenvironments were more profound in advertisements related to energy andautomobiles, perhaps in a way to soften their harmful effects on the environment.Advertisements showing industrial environments contained claims of greatervagueness and ambiguity. Use of company personnel was more obvious in relationto electricity supply, paper products, and business services, while the use of animalsappeared more in advertisements pertaining to agriculture/forestry/fishing,waterworks and supply, and mines. The use of both environmental websites andenvironmental slogans was associated more with advertisements making strong,specific, and acceptable claims, and the same pattern occurred with regard toenvironmental certification.

Summary and conclusionsFrom this study, we can conclude that the international green advertising scenehas changed dramatically during the past two decades on many different fronts.For example, with regard to advertiser profile, we observed a growing appreciation byinternational firms of the role of advertising in developing a green image. This isparticularly true of large multinational corporations in industries often accused ofpolluting the environment. However, most of these firms exhibited an irregular green

23

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practices

advertising pattern, reflecting a reactive response to external and/or internal eventsrelated to the environment. From a country perspective, we also noted different, butchanging, patterns in green advertising, with US and British firms gradually takingthe lead from their German counterparts. Although the manufacturing sector(particularly producers of industrial goods) has predominantly used green advertising,other types of organizations (e.g. suppliers) and other sectors of economic activity(e.g. mining) have only recently embraced it.

The thrust of green advertising activity mostly pertaining to heavy industry goods(e.g. energy, transport equipment, metal/non-metallic) demonstrates firms’ attempts toalleviate (and, in some cases, mask) environmental accusations made against them byvarious parties. Our study also shows that there is a gradual shift of emphasis in greenadvertising from business to consumer buyers, stressing the growing importanceof environmental marketing in consumer markets. In addition, the tendency in greenadvertisements to increasingly stress issues related to consumption, rather thanproduction, aspects of the product cycle highlights advertisers’ response to increasingcriticism about product emission levels, recycling problems, and after-product lifesolutions. The trend observed to increase the amount of detail in green advertisementscould mirror:

. the heavy investment made by many firms in environmental equipment andprocesses;

. the need to differentiate from the competition by communicating a green imageto current and prospective buyers; and

. the multiplicity of environment-related problems, requiring more extensiveand in-depth handling.

The greater focus of green advertisements on product-oriented claims than on process-oriented, image-oriented, or environmental fact-based claims, denotes firms’ tendencyto enhance green claims that are more easily observable, clearly understood, andpractically useful for protecting the environment. In addition, firms’ inclination todesign messages that are more specific and detailed on environmental matters, placestronger emphasis on the environment, and contain less ambiguity, expresses a moreresponsible approach to green advertising. To a great extent, this could be attributedto repeated accusations made against several firms by regulatory bodies (e.g. FederalTrade Commission), stakeholder groups (e.g. Greenpeace), and independent agencies(e.g. Enviromedia Social Marketing Corporation) for “green-washing” practices.

Copy-related dimensions of green advertising also exhibited distinct features and trends.For example, headlines (and sub-headings) were largely declarative and informative, whilebody copy adopted mainly a descriptive mode and a rational tone. These findings showthat the environmental topic is new and complex and thus, it is important to:

. provide explicit information on the issues;

. stress the benefits associated with protection of the environment accruing fromthe adoption of green methods and procedures;

. emphasize the firm’s environmental activities, which allows buyers to drawcomparisons with “non-green” competitors; and

. stress the importance and seriousness of the topic for the company and allstakeholders involved.

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IMR28,1

Situation points of green advertising also reflected the idiosyncratic nature ofenvironmental issues. For example, illustrations mainly showed external environment-focused scenes, whether natural, artificial, or industrial. One striking result is thecomplete absence of presenters in more than half of green advertisements. However, incases in which presenters were used, they were mainly human beings and animals,which symbolize the need to preserve life on the planet. In contrast to other dimensionsof green advertising, illustration characteristics did not reveal any clear-cut tendency.With the exception of environmental websites, identification marks associated withgreen characteristics were virtually absent. To some extent, this could be due to thetime required to obtain these marks such as green awards, environmental certification,and green trademarks.

The study also revealed the existence of many interaction effects among thedifferent dimensions of the advertisements (i.e. advertiser profile, targeting features,message aspects, copy characteristics, and situation points). For example, theadvertiser and the country in which it is based seem to determine the design andthe execution of international green advertisements. The nature of the productsadvertised also had an important effect on the message, copy, and situation points ofgreen advertisements. Some strong inter-relationships among the items of eachadvertising dimension also existed, as in the case of deep green advertisements, whichwere associated with specific, strong, and acceptable claims.

Managerial implicationsThe role of international green advertising in communicating a firm’s environmentallyfriendly practices to various audiences is important. This study shows thatinternational organizations with a long and successful presence in the market haveused this form of advertising extensively to build a pro-environmental image. However,it is important to adopt a systematic, proactive, and well-planned approach to greenadvertising, rather than merely reacting to internal crisis situations, ecologicaldisasters, or environmental public criticisms. Green advertising should be regarded asan indispensable part of the firm’s overall environmental marketing strategy that canhelp it gain sustainable competitive advantage and achieve superior performance.

International environmental advertising is too idiomorphic in conceiving,designing, and executing message, copy, and situation points. The unique, complex,and sensitive character of issues related to the environment requires cautioushandling to achieve maximum effectiveness. Therefore, firms should formulate anadvertising strategy that considers various stakeholders’ environmental concerns, andsubsequently should turn these into reasons for making the company more attractivethan its competitors. However, our study showed that, to win the credibility andtrust of both consumers and stakeholders, a firm’s environmental claims shouldbe detailed, specific, and truthful. This is particularly relevant today because ofrepeated accusations of misleading green advertising claims.

This study shows that green advertising is not static but rather is constantlyevolving as a result of changes in firms’ internal and external forces. Therefore, it isimportant to carefully monitor trends in the market, and adopt ideas from best practicein the field (e.g. Advertising Standards Authority’s guidelines for environmentalclaims). Firms also need to foresee future developments with regard to environmentalissues and take proactive measures when designing green advertising campaigns.Finally, and most important, firms’ environmental claims should be clear,understandable, and considered valid by the receivers of the message.

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The multifarious nature of the international green advertisements examinedstresses the need to design different environmental advertising campaigns targetedat groups of buyers with different environmental involvement. For example, althoughan increasing number of buyers choose products by relying solely on theirenvironmental credentials, firms should take extra care to attract the attention ofpeople who tend to ignore environmental claims by conveying advertising messagesthat combine green attributes (e.g. recyclable packaging) with other product attributes(e.g. quality).

Limitations and future researchThe findings of this study should be viewed within the context of certain limitations,which could provide the basis for further research on the subject. First, as a result ofthe content analysis method used to evaluate international green advertisements, wecould not trace various external factors (e.g. political-legal, socio-economic,technological) with a potential effect on shaping firms’ green advertising strategies.Although inherent difficulties exist in carrying out such an investigation because ofthe heterogeneity, complexity, and volatility of the international business environment,it is crucial to understand the specific conditions surrounding green advertising. Itwould also be beneficial to trace whether green advertisements were designed inresponse to external stakeholders or were the result of firms’ proactive environmentalbehaviour (Polonsky and Hyman, 2007).

Second, the content analysis did not enable us to measure the communicationeffectiveness of green advertisements. It is vital to understand the opinion of theaudiences targeted by these advertisements directly in terms of the degree ofinvolvement, likability, and persuasion. It would also be insightful if the results of thissurvey were combined with the characteristics (e.g. environmental claims, executionstyles, presentation types) of the green advertisements extracted from the analysisundertaken. This would also help identify the exact profile (e.g. demographic,psychographic, behavioural) of the people targeted and better understand theirrequirements with regard to the design, execution, and presentation of environmentaladvertisements.

Third, it might be useful to combine the information collected for this study withsecondary data pertaining to the performance of the specific company/productadvertised. Here, research could carry out three types of analyses:

(1) compare and contrast performance indicators (e.g. sales, market share,customer satisfaction) before and after the green advertisement is launched;

(2) examine whether specific message, copy, and situation aspects of the greenadvertisement are conducive to superior market and/or financial performance;and

(3) identify potential moderating effects on the link between advertisingcharacteristics and company performance.

Although our study covered a wide array of issues pertaining to internationaladvertising, other important dimensions warrant attention such as the degree of afirm’s standardization/adaptation of green advertisements in different countries(Christmann, 2004), the effectiveness of green advertising claims across cultures(Sriram and Forman, 1993), the way consumers across cultures perceive environmentalclaims (Hartmann and Apaolaza-Ibanez, 2009), the level of consistency between

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international green claims and actual environmental marketing behaviour (Polonskyet al., 1997), and the impact of home country environmental values on internationalgreen advertising implementation (Rugman and Verbeke, 1998).

The focus of our study was on a single international advertising medium, TheEconomist. Thus, further research might incorporate additional internationalmagazines, as well as draw comparisons between green advertisements appearingin international business magazines and those in international consumer magazines.Subsequent research should also extend its investigation on green advertisements toother international advertising media, such as television, radio, and the Internet.

Our study focused exclusively on international green advertisements, thoughfurther research could examine their effectiveness in comparison with non-greenadvertisements. In this context, it would also be useful to determine whetherconsumers in different countries consider environmental claims more convincing thanproduct performance claims when making their purchasing decisions. Furtherresearch might also determine whether green or non-green advertisements are moreeffective among buyers who are environmentally conscious than among buyers whohave low sensitivity toward ecological issues. It would also be worthwhile to examinethe nature and effectiveness of ethical, social and environmental advertising claims indifferent cultural settings (Polonsky and Jevons, 2009; Mogele and Tropp, 2010).

The legal and regulatory climate prevailing in a country sets the boundaries withinwhich firms formulate their green advertisements (Welch and Wilkinson, 2004). Assuch, it would be useful to examine how this influences the way firms communicatetheir environmental commitment in foreign markets (Carlson et al., 1996). Furthermore,various regulatory and self-regulatory organizations have repeatedly requested greaterclarity of environmental claims in green advertisements (Polonsky et al., 1997). Futureresearch could investigate how organizations in various countries evaluate the veracityof the claims made, a well as determine their role in adjusting green advertisements ofinternational firms across countries.

Finally, it would be illuminating to identify how a firm’s green advertising strategydiffers relative to its approach to foreign markets such as its international strategicperspective (e.g. multi-domestic versus global), the number of countries it serves (e.g.concentration versus spreading), and its mode of operating in each country (e.g.exporting versus direct investment). It would also be useful if such analysis coulddraw comparisons between international firms located in developed countries andthose originating from emerging economies (Yin and Ma, 2009). Differences in greenadvertising practices could also be identified according to whether the foreign marketis mature or developing.

Notes

1. We attributed the inconsistencies observed in selecting the remaining advertisements toseveral factors:

. they included technical terms that were of a general nature rather than providing specificor relevant environmental claims;

. they referred to corporate social responsibility issues, without making a clear focus onenvironmental matters;

. they presented natural environments, without making any particular reference to greenissues and/or sustainability; and

. they were more or less the same as other advertisements published in previous periods,with only slight differences.

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2. To a great extent, this advertising pattern comes as a response to specific environmentalevents that marked the world society. For example, during the 1988-1994 period,the Environmental Assessment Directive was implemented across Europe, theinter-governmental Panel on Climate Change was established, and the UN Conference onEnvironment and Development was held in Rio de Janeiro (Easterling et al., 1996; Iyer, 1995).The 1995-2001 period experienced a sharp decline in green advertising activity, probablybecause of elevated fears that green positioning was becoming an anti-issue, increasingconcerns about green-washing claims, and the growing number of green product failures(Corbett, 2002; Neff, 2000). This situation was reversed during the 2002-2007 period, whenintense political discussion and revived consumer interest re-emerged as a result of eventssuch as the UN World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg, the publicationof the first Environmental Performance Index, and the initiation of reviews of greenmarketing guidelines and environmental products (Visser, 2009).

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Appendix

Year Event Nature

1988 Implementation across Europe of EnvironmentalAssessment Directive

Policy initiatives

1988 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)established

Climate change

1988 Assassination of the well known ecological activist ChicoMendez

Crisis event

1989 Exxon Valdez disaster in Alaska Crisis event1990 Principle of integrated pollution control in United Kingdom

Environmental Protection ActPolicy initiatives

1990 London Agreement on ozone depletion material phase out Policy initiatives1990 Defeat of California “big green” environmental legislation;

local adoption of many aspectsGreen opposition

1990 1st IPCC report finds 0.51C warming Climate change1991 Proposal for European Environmental Agency Policy initiatives1991 Draft Eco-Audit Directive, Europe Policy initiatives1991 Petrobras P36 oil platform sinks off Brazilian coast Crisis event1992 In opposition to local environmental regulation, many

California companies in deep recession threaten removal toless regulated states

Green opposition

1992 GATT publishes report on world free trade andenvironmental issues

Policy initiatives

1992 UN Conference on Environment and Development (the“Earth Summit”) in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

World summits; Climatechange

1992 UN Environmental Programme (UNEP) Banking Initiativelaunched

Industry initiatives

1992 The Business Council for Sustainable Developmentpublishes Changing Course

Industry initiatives

1992 FTC publishes green marketing guidelines for the first time Practice guidelines1993 Forrest Stewardship Council (FSC) established Industry initiatives1993 Eco-Management and Audit Scheme (EMAS) enacted by the

EUCodes and standards

1994 Green Globe standard for travel and tourism launched Industry initiatives1995 Shell Brent Spar and Nigeria crises Crisis event1995 Second IPCC report predicts significant socioeconomic

impactsClimate change

1996 ISO 14001 environmental management standard launched Codes and standards1996 FTC revises green marketing guidelines Practice guidelines1997 Kyoto Protocol sets targets for 34 major economies (enforced

in 2005 and ratified by 187 states by 2009)Climate change

1997 Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) established Industry initiatives1997 UN Environmental Programme (UNEP) Insurance Industry

Initiative (III) formedIndustry initiatives

1997 Fair trade standard launched internationally Codes and standards1997 Asian ecological and financial chaos Crisis event1998 Oil pipeline explosion at Jesse, Nigeria Crisis event1998 Cement Sustainability Initiative launched Industry initiatives

(continued)

Table AI.Landmark events related

to environmental issuesduring the 1988-2007

period

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About the authors

Leonidas C. Leonidou (PhD, MSc, University of Bath) is a Professor of Marketing at the School ofEconomics and Management of the University of Cyprus. His current research interests are in theareas of international marketing/purchasing, relationship marketing, strategic marketing, andmarketing in emerging economies. He has published extensively in these fields and his articlesappear in various journals such as the European Journal of Marketing, Industrial Marketing

Management, Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Journal of Business Research,Journal of International Business Studies, Journal of International Marketing, and Journal of

World Business.Constantinos N. Leonidou (PhD, University of Leeds; MBA, Cardiff University) is a Lecturer

in Marketing at Leeds University Business School, University of Leeds, UK. His mainresearch interests focus on sustainability, international marketing, consumer behaviour, andadvertising. His research has appeared in various journals such as the European Journal of

Marketing, Industrial Marketing Management, and Journal of International Marketing.

Constantinos N. Leonidou is the corresponding author and can be contacted at:C.Leonidou@leeds.ac.uk

Dayananda Palihawadana (PhD, MSc, University of Strathclyde) is a Senior Lecturer inMarketing at Leeds University Business School, University of Leeds, UK. His research interests

Year Event Nature

1998 FTC revises green marketing guidelines Practice guidelines2000 Mining and Minerals for Sustainable Development (MMSD)

project startedIndustry initiatives

2000 GRI Sustainability Reporting Guidelines launched Codes and Standards2000 Carbon Disclosure Project established Sustainability reporting2000 Environmental Sustainability index first published State of the planet2001 Third IPCC report shows rising temperatures and sea levels Climate change2002 UN World Summit on Sustainable Development (the “Earth

Summit þ 10” in Johannesburg, South AfricaWorld summits

2003 Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil created Industry initiatives2004 Gas explosion in Daping coal mine in Henan province in

ChinaCrisis event

2005 EU GHG Emission Trading Scheme begins trading Climate change2005 Millennium Ecosystem Assessment published State of the planet2005 Corporate Leaders Group on Climate Change issues first

open letterLeadership initiatives

2006 Stern Review on Economics of Climate Change published Climate change2006 ISO 14064 standard on GHG accounting and verification

launchedCodes and standards

2006 Environmental Performance Index first published State of the planet2007 Fourth IPCC report shows 90% certainty of human cause of

climate changeClimate change

2007 FTC initiates review of green marketing guidelines andenvironmental products, including carbon offsets

Practice guidelines

Source: Compiled from Peattie (1995, 2001), IISD (2010), and Visser (2009)Table AI.

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are mainly in international marketing, electronic marketing, and relationship marketing. He haspublished in various journals, including the European Journal of Marketing, Journal of

Advertising Research, and International Marketing Review.Magnus Hultman (PhD, MSc, Lulea University of Technology) is a Lecturer in Marketing at

Leeds University Business School, University of Leeds, UK. Although his research centres oninternational marketing strategy and export performance, he writes on a range of topicsincluding electronic supply chain management, marketing communications, and brandmanagement. His research has appeared in journals such as Journal of International

Marketing and Tourism Management among others.

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