As Consumers Cut Spending, ‘Green’ Products Lose Allure

[onehandle]

When Clorox introduced Green Works, its environment-friendly cleaning line, in 2008, it secured an endorsement from the Sierra Club, a nationwide introduction at Wal-Mart, and it vowed that the products would “move natural cleaning into the mainstream.”

Sales that year topped $100 million, and several other major consumer products companies came out with their own “green” cleaning supplies.

But America’s eco-consciousness, it turns out, is fickle. As recession gripped the country, the consumer’s love affair with green products, from recycled toilet paper to organic foods to hybrid cars, faded like a bad infatuation. While farmers’ markets and Prius sales are humming along now, household product makers like Clorox just can’t seem to persuade mainstream customers to buy green again.

Sales of Green Works have fallen to about $60 million a year, and those of other similar products from major brands like Arm & Hammer, Windex, Palmolive, Hefty and Scrubbing Bubbles are sputtering. “Every consumer says, ‘I want to help the environment, I’m looking for eco-friendly products,’ ” said David Donnan, a partner in the consumer products practice at the consulting firm A. T. Kearney. “But if it’s one or two pennies higher in price, they’re not going to buy it. There is a discrepancy between what people say and what they do.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/22/business/energy-environment/22green.html

America. Fuck yeah.

[tridim]

1. Mission accomplished.

Well, at least one mission accomplished.

I fucking hate Republicans.

[villager]

2. Green products cost more because the true costs of the "cheaper" products are externalized

...just as with food, driving, and everything else...

[Motown_Johnny]

3. which is something our tax code should reflect

by granting subsidies to greener products and taxing non-green products at a higher rate

[truedelphi]

8. Some cleaning products are items where the companies are dumping

Stuff that should be taken by those companies to Superfund sites.

So it doesn't really matter what they charge for those products - in any event, once a consumer buys them, the company has saved the huge Superfund charges.

[DJ13]

4. “But if it’s one or two pennies higher in price, they’re not going to buy it."

They are usually substantially higher in price than one or two pennies, and in an era of stagnant wages and ever higher non discretionary expenses (rising energy and food) every little bit counts.

These corporations only make "green" products because they see higher profits, not because they actually believe in saving the ecology.

[no_hypocrisy]

5. I make my own green products with stuff like baking soda, borax, hydrogen peroxide, etc.

[jdlh8894]

6. And I'll bet

Those products have gone up in price,too!

[Hannah Bell]

7. green products, for the most part, = scam.

[truedelphi]

9. As far as cleaning products - green is cheap if you make up your own

Dish soap can clean up most things around the house.

Vinegar with a touch of lemon to do bathroom counter and kitchen tile.
If tile is really grungy, I set some baking soda on it for a while, with just a drop of water.

[cali]

10. true for those products but as the NYT points out in another article

not true for companies like seventh generation.

April 21, 2011, 8:59 pm
For a Few, Focus on Green Products Pays Off
By ANDREW MARTIN and STEPHANIE CLIFFORD
Green: Business

These days, it seems, the provenance of green products matters.

Manufacturers who have long aligned themselves with environmental causes, like Seventh Generation and Method, have rebounded better from the recession than the “green” lines of larger, more traditional manufacturers.

Analysts say the reason is that the niche manufacturers tend to attract serious green customers who want products that are good for the environment even if they cost more. And if these customers find that a botanical ingredient isn’t quite as effective as bleach, they believe it is better for their house and lungs.

As we report in an article in The Times, sales of green products over all dropped during the recession. But the committed customers have been quicker to come back to environmentally friendly products, compared to the much larger audience of mainstream customers, who may have been willing to buy green products when times were flush but scaled back when price started to matter.

<snip>

http://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/04/21/rebound-for-product-makers-with-green-focus/?src=mv#

[CoffeeCat]

11. Been in a grocery store lately?

I don't care what the government statistics say, prices of many routinely purchased food and grocery items
have gone up 30 percent-50 percent.

I am totally blown away when I do my grocery shopping and see the prices. It's shocking.

I pay attention to price, probably more than the average consumer. I belong to a coupon and savings online
group and I vigilantly watch prices. I even have a notebook of product prices--that I've kept for years. I keep
this notebook, so I can keep track of what a truly good deal is. The trends are--shrinking packages and increased
prices.

People want to stretch a dollar as much as possible. Cleaning supplies aren't exactly essential for everyday
living--like items such as milk, bread, produce, cereals, rice, etc. My guess is that people are buying
a generic container of bleach that costs 68 cents, if they're even buying it at all! This story focuses on
the consumer purchasing fewer "green" products, but I bet they're purchasing fewer cleaning supplies in general.
I bet this decreased purchasing has also affected sales of non-essential items such as fabric softener, dryer
sheets, dishwasher spot removers, air fresheners, and stain removers.

For people interested in grocery-store wonky facts--I've also noticed couponing trends. I'm one of those people
who saves 30-70 each trip, so I know of what I speak! I've notice that coupon values are increasing, as they
did in 2008--when the shineola really hit the economic fan. Starbuck's rarely issues coupons for their ground
coffee, but I recently saw a $1.50 coupon. Kraft is notorious for being stingy with coupons, and they rarely issue
cheese coupons. I've seen more Kraft Cheese coupons lately and most for $1. Very, very rare. People are simply
buying more generic.

No matter what the government statistics or egghead "experts" say about our economy--I always know when the economy
is tanking by looking at coupon trends, promotions and grocery-store prices.