Green Marketing1 - Vitamin Water

I think there is a new, important trend that is emerging, and that is green marketing. I define green marketing as selling a product to customers, and providing them with information on how to dispose of it after they finish it, or that a product is made of 60% recyclable plastic, or even that it will biodegrade in less than 5 years after its use is complete. People are more and more environmentally conscious, and hold forward-looking companies in high esteem.

I'm majoring in marketing and minoring in environment. I think I was always interested in business because I find there is more opportunity and more chance that I would make money (this is important to me, to be honest). The environment, on the other hand, has always been important to me in a different way. My mom always made us recycle when we were young, and the habit carried on with me until now. I'm very precise in what I recycle and throw away, and in what I waste, in my opinion. Like, I literally freak out if I see someone throw a paper in the trash bin. It seems unnatural, wrong, and I actually get mad.

So I figured I would couple the two and make a difference. There has got to be a way that I can change people's habits, or make people feel better about purchasing something that won't hurt their planet. I know one of the main drivers that makes me recycle, or make better environmental choices, is that I don't want to live in a degrading environment. When I'm only 50, I don't want to be obliged to walk around with an oxygen mask, or fight others for water, or only have two meals a day because there simply isn't enough food to go around. I don't want to contract serious illnesses because of a higher population. I know these scenarios are probably over-exaggerations, but I'm afraid of these outcomes, and I want and need to change them.

The most important and pending question I can think of, as a marketer and as an environmentalist, is how can we get people to want to be environmentally conscious?



For today's blog, I will be focusing on Vitamin Water. It's a flavoured water drink that's supposed to contain vitamins people usually don't get enough of. Despite the fact that is one of the most disappointing new hyped products I have tried in a long time, they advertise the recycling symbol on the bottom of the bottle in a great way. Next to the typical recycling symbol, it reads, "30 may be the new 20, but green is definitely the new black. please recycle."

First of all, all the lettering is in lowercase. This really gives and informal appeal to the ad, like it's speaking to us in a casual conversation. Next, "green is definitely the new black" makes recycling sound like the "it" thing to do, the hottest trend for today's modern person. This little sentence relates to people on a deeper, personal level. It makes you appreciate the creativity and entices you to make an effort and recycle the bottle. I think it's a great way of giving more space to the recycling logo on the bottle and I even think it can increase the chances of it actually being recycled.

Want to know more?
The image was retrieved from Google.
See more about Vitamin Water on their Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/vitaminwater?v=app_352976184252#!/vitaminwater?v=wall