Brand Immersion: Damon Endorses Indelible Waste

In today's issue of Brand Week, Kenneth Hein has written an article about how Coke and Pepsi are suffering a "beverage backlash." Bottled water growth rates are slipping into the single digits, down from double digit growth experienced for the last decade.

To accelerate demand, these beverage giants are signing up celebrities to hawk bottled water by offering part of the proceeds from bottled water sales to various charities that are organized around clean water initiatives.

I'm all for supporting philanthropic giving and believe that making a profit while doing so is just fine (ala RED). This giving, however, comes with a price that is unacceptable. This giving is attached to the propagation of indelible waste.

Wake up Coke and Pepsi and shame on you Mr. Damon! Stop trying to justify trafficking bottled water by stimulating demand and cloaking its purchase in celebrity endorsement and good causes.

Brand Immersion: Making Sustainability Personal

I'll start this post by stating that I am NOT a WalMart shopper. I've actively avoided shopping there because this is a retailer that has a long history of imposing the founder's politics on communities and treating employees badly.

That said, WalMart's efforts in the last 18 months to embrace sustainability are laudable. Their pressure on suppliers to reduce packaging, their actions to reduce the carbon footprint of their retail environments, and now, their efforts to educate 1.3 million employees about personal sustainable commitments are all active and progressive steps in making sustainability a mass market, main stream imperative.

Take a look at this video (and pardon me for subjecting you to the ridiculous interviewer) about WalMart's Personal Sustainability Practice initiative.

http://link.brightcove.com/services/link/bcpid1185071587/bctid1415631111
that are organized around clean water initiatives.

I'm all for supporting philanthropic giving and believe that making a profit while doing so is just fine (ala RED). This giving, however, comes with a price that is unacceptable. This giving is attached to the propagation of indelible waste.

Wake up Coke and Pepsi and shame on you Mr. Damon! Stop trying to justify trafficking bottled water by stimulating demand and cloaking its purchase in celebrity endorsement and good causes.

Brand Immersion: Meet Me at SXSW Interactive

Brand Immersion: Water for All

Water. Vital to our existence. In the United States we've elevated water to being a status symbol. There are those who feel compelled to spend handsomely on bottled water. And others who understand the folly of that. But what happens when access to water makes it a very dear and scarce resource? Here's an amazing and beautifully designed innovation for those in third-world countries who must travel for their water and contend with sanitary storage of it.