Leonid Ou 2011

International Marketing Review
Evaluating the green advertising practices of international firms: a trend analysis

Leonidas C. Leonidou Constantinos N. Leonidou Dayananda Palihawadana Magnus Hultman
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Leonidas C. Leonidou Constantinos N. Leonidou Dayananda Palihawadana Magnus Hultman,
(2011),"Evaluating the green advertising practices of international firms: a trend analysis", International
Marketing Review, Vol. 28 Iss 1 pp. 6 - 33
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IMR
28,1
Evaluating the green advertising
practices of international firms:
a trend analysis
6 Leonidas C. Leonidou
University of Cyprus, Nicosia, Cyprus, and
Received January 2010
Revised June 2010 Constantinos N. Leonidou, Dayananda Palihawadana and
Accepted August 2010
Magnus Hultman
Leeds University Business School, University of Leeds, Leeds, UK
Abstract
Purpose – Consumer scepticism about the credibility of green advertising around the world is
growing. The article aims to provide a comprehensive assessment and trend analysis of green
advertising practices of international firms over a 20-year period.
Design/methodology/approach – The study identifies 473 international green advertisements
during the 1988-2007 period and content-analyses them on five major axes: advertiser profile, targeting
features, message aspects, copy characteristics, and situation points.
Findings – The content analysis reveals significant trends in all major areas examined and identifies
important interaction effects between certain dimensions of green advertisements.
Research limitations/implications – The findings could be augmented by combining them with
changes in the external environment, input from consumers about advertising effectiveness, the views
of advertisers and advertising agencies, and secondary data referring to the performance of the
specific company/product advertised.
Originality/value – Green advertising research mainly focuses on domestic rather than international
advertisements; 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 by
systematically evaluating international green advertisements over a long period and using an
integrated framework of analysis that is based on the extant literature. It also explores potential
interaction effects between key dimensions describing these advertisements.
Keywords Green marketing, Advertising, Environmental management, International marketing
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
Intensifying environmental regulations by governments and other bodies, growing
pressures on organizations by stakeholder groups to preserve the environment, and
rising concern of the general public about the harmful effects of certain industry
practices on the ecology are issues responsible for the phenomenal increase worldwide
in the number of firms adopting environmentally friendly approaches in their sourcing,
operating, and marketing activities (Gurău and Ranchhod, 2005; Menon and Menon,
1997; Polonsky and Rosenberger, 2001; Sriram and Forman, 1993). Advertising plays
a critical role in communicating this pro-environmental image while harnessing an
eco-friendly consciousness among consumers and organizations (Grillo et al., 2008;
Iyer and Banerjee, 1993). Recent evidence has shown that green advertising has grown
exponentially in the last two decades (Futerra, 2008), becoming the driving force
International Marketing Review behind increasing public awareness of ecological issues and skyrocketing demand for
Vol. 28 No. 1, 2011
pp. 6-33 eco-friendly goods (Easterling et al., 1996; Polonsky et al., 1997).
r Emerald Group Publishing Limited
0265-1335
Despite the benefits offered, green advertising activity has run into major problems,
DOI 10.1108/02651331111107080 with people in many countries becoming increasingly sceptical about its credibility,
validity, and usefulness (Pfanner, 2008). Some of the reasons causing this scepticism Green
can be attributed to the growing number of companies promoting their environmental advertising
credentials, the increasing buyer complaints to various watchdog organizations
(e.g. European Advertising Standards Alliance, the US Federal Trade Commission) practices
about misleading claims (Knight, 2008), and consumer concerns about the way many
green-themed advertisements are made and presented.
Numerous studies have been conducted to understand the nature, structure, and 7
content of green advertising, making this a field of environmental marketing research
of its own (Leonidou and Leonidou, 2011). Although it provides useful insights for
advertisers, advertising agencies, public policymakers, and other interested parties,
this body of research suffers from various gaps: first, the majority of investigations
have had a domestic emphasis, despite the growing importance of international
green advertisements as a result of intensifying globalization trends; second, the
approach to evaluating environmental advertisements has been fragmented, with
important issues being investigated in isolation from others; third, the message, copy,
and situation characteristics of green advertisements have been partially and/or
inadequately examined; and fourth, in most cases, environmental advertisements have
been evaluated at a specific point in time (or covered over a short period of time), thus
preventing temporal trends from being established.
This study aims to fill these gaps, by systematically providing a comprehensive
assessment and trend analysis of green advertising practice by international firms
over a 20-year period. It specifically attempts to provide answers to the following
questions: What are the profile characteristics of firms engaged in international green
advertising? What are the targeting features of their advertisements, in terms of
products, audience, focus, and level of greenness? What types of environmental claims
are 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, and
what is the specific mode and tone of the body copy? What forms of settings and
presenters are employed in illustrations, and what types of identification marks are
shown? Lastly, are there any interaction effects between key dimensions describing
international green advertisements?
We have organized the remainder of this article as follows: We first review the
literature on green advertising and discuss the key issues. Then, we explain the
methodology adopted to carry out the study, focusing on the scope of research,
sampling frame, research instrument, coding process, and analytical method. Next, we
present and discuss the findings of the study with regard to each of the research
questions – namely, advertiser profile, targeting features, message aspects, copy
characteristics, situation points, and interaction effects. In the next section, we
summarize 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 literature

Environmental (or green) advertisements refer to all appeals that include ecological,
environmental sustainability, or nature-friendly messages that target the needs and
desires of environmentally concerned stakeholders (Zinkhan and Carlson, 1995). These
fall under three major categories:
(1) those that directly or indirectly address the relationship between a product/
service and the natural environment;
IMR (2) those that promote an environmentally responsible lifestyle with or without
28,1 highlighting 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. helping
8 stakeholders understand the nature of environmental issues), others are purely
commercial in nature (e.g. inducing people to buy the company’s products and become
regular customers), and still others are image-focused (e.g. enhancing the firm’s green
profile) (Banerjee et al., 1995; Menon et al., 1999). Corporations wanting to support their
domestic and international environmental marketing strategies widely use green
advertising, regardless of its content (Belz and Peattie, 2009).
The first environmental advertisements appeared in the late 1960s, when the
scientific community, public opinion, and consumer activism raised the first concerns
about 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 an
environmentally friendly approach in their business to customers, regulators, and
other stakeholders (Kinnear and Taylor, 1973; Peattie, 1995). However, it was not until
the late 1980s that green advertising experienced a sharp increase, mainly because
of heightened public awareness and concern, spiralling competitive pressures, and
stricter government regulations related to the environment (Carlson et al., 1996;
Kilbourne, 2004). False advertising claims, exaggerated green messages, and consumer
confusion regarding green terminologies were some of the reasons for the decrease of
green 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, when
strong global political support, sound international legislative developments, and
renewed 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 many
marketing scholars who followed various streams of research (Leonidou and Leonidou,
2011). The first is green washing, which pertains to the validity and deceptiveness of
environmental advertisements (Kangun et al., 1991; Kärnä 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 clear
meaning;
(2) omission, excluding important information to evaluate its truthfulness or
reasonableness;
(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 misleadingness

or deception in the advertisements examined (Kangun et al., 1991; Carlson et al., 1993;
Kärnä et al., 2001), indicating a serious problem in the advertising industry in
accurately portraying and promoting the environmental credentials of firms.
Another stream of research focused on environmental claims, which Carlson
et al. (1993) classify as product-oriented, process-oriented, image-oriented, and
environmental fact. Studies belonging to this research stream found that Green
image-oriented claims were used most frequently but, at the same time, were the advertising
most ambiguous, while product claims, though popular, were the most deceptive. In
addition, Easterling et al. (1996) reported that different types of approaches have practices
been used to communicate environmental messages over time, with image-oriented
and process-related claims used in the early years of environmentalism and
product-oriented claims used in recent years. However, contradictory results 9
were 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) indicating
minimal usage.
Advertising greenness, which measures the level of environmental information
included in advertisements, was the object of another group of researchers. In terms
of greenness, Banerjee et al. (1995) grouped environmental advertisements into
the following categories: shallow, moderate, and deep. This classification was
subsequently augmented with additional levels of greenness, such as the

five-dimensional typology that Wagner and Hansen (2002), Kilbourne (1995), and
Grillo et al. (2008) adopted. Most studies revealed that advertising claims had
mainly a shallow or moderate greenness, denoting a lack of substantiveness,
comprehensiveness, and credibility. In contrast, advertisements that contained deep
environmental claims were mainly characterized by high effectiveness in conveying
their messages (Manrai et al., 1997).
Another group of studies (e.g. D’Souza and Taghian, 2005; Schuhwerk and
Lefkoff-Hagius, 1995) investigated the effect of environmental advertising messages
on consumer behaviour. Several contradictions have been observed in this line of
research. For example, Newell et al. (1998) found that consumer perceptions of green
claim deception did not have an effect on advertiser credibility, attitudes toward
the advertisement/brand, and purchase intent; and according to Chan et al. (2006),
substantive environmental claims for high-involvement services were more effective
than associative environmental claims. Two other studies tried to ascertain the role
of 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 by
green appeals, D’Souza and Taghian (2005) revealed the opposite.
The examination of copy and situation aspects of environmental advertisements
provided another stream of research. With regard to copy aspects, evidence shows
that there was a shift in the language used over time (e.g. Banerjee et al., 1995; Iyer
and Banerjee, 1993; Wagner and Hansen, 2002). For example, early advertisements
on the subject highlighted such ecological terms as “disposable”, “recyclable”, and
“pre-packaged”; however, these have been gradually replaced by more contemporary
words such as “organic”, “energy efficient”, and “sustainably sourced” (Peattie, 1995).
Although green advertisements can have different tones of expression, ranging from
rational and emotional to moral and zeitgeist (Banerjee et al., 1995), rational appeals
(particularly those promoting self-interest rather than social conscience) were found
more suitable (Fiori, 1989). With regard to situation points, various elements have been
used to improve the comprehensiveness of the green advertising message (Grillo et al.,
2008). Some examples include environmental-related setting graphics (e.g. natural
wildlife), nature-related presenters (e.g. animals), and green identification marks (e.g.
green logotypes or certification labels) (Banerjee et al., 1995; Kärnä et al., 2001; Wagner
and Hansen, 2002).
IMR Finally, although many international corporations have extensively used
28,1 advertising to communicate their environmental practices to the global market, only
a few studies focused on international green advertising. Carlson et al. (1996) and
Polonsky et al. (1997) were the first to investigate green advertising claims in an
international context, by comparing environmental advertising practices in the United
States, Canada, Great Britain, and Australia. Their findings revealed significant
10 differences in green advertisements among the four countries, with US advertisements
characterized by fewer environmental and more associative claims. Another group of
scholars examined the role of the country of origin in influencing the effectiveness of
environmental claims. Their findings confirmed that the ecological reputation of the
product’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 in
maximizing the effectiveness of green claims. Surprisingly, other key green advertising
issues examined in a domestic domain remained relatively untapped.
Study method
We confined our study to environmental/green advertisements that had an
international focus, that is, advertisements with environmental messages targeting
audiences located in more than one country (Douglas and Craig, 2002). We identified
these advertisements from the international edition of The Economist, a widely
read publication focusing on business, economics, and political issues, with a
weekly circulation of more than one million copies. The magazine is also a global
advertising outlet, covering almost all countries in the world, with the USA
accounting for half of all subscribers. Altogether, the study covered 944 magazine
issues published during the 1988-2007 period, a sufficiently lengthy time to establish
trends on the evolution of international green advertising. Owing to the exploratory
nature of the study, we placed no limitations on selecting the advertisements in
terms of type of advertiser, nature of the products advertised, or the advertisement’s
target audience.
Two specially trained researchers independently searched all issues of the magazine
for the 20-year period. To trace any advertisements with an ecological flair, the
following steps were taken:
(1) the two researchers received definitions of green advertisements derived from
the pertinent environmental marketing literature;
(2) examples of international advertisements containing green claims were
provided to understand their nature;
(3) a list of keywords such as “environmental”, “ecological”, “sustainable”,
“natural”, and “green”, were employed to facilitate the identification of relevant
advertisements;
(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 523
advertisements, respectively, with an environmental focus. A comparison of the two
sets of advertisements revealed that only 431 were the same; this represents a
consistency level of approximately 80 percent[1]. The remaining advertisements Green
were discussed with the principal investigator to agree on including another 42 advertising
advertisements relevant to the study. This resulted in a final sample that comprised
473 different green advertisements. practices
Notably, the annual frequency of the green advertisements did not follow a clear
pattern during the period of investigation (see Figure 1). That is, at the beginning of the
study period, the number of these advertisements was relatively high (reaching 58 in 11
1990), 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 to
48 in 2006). These “ups and downs” in international green advertising activity greatly
reflect various worldwide events related to environmental issues[2]. From the
advertising pattern, we divided our sample for analytical purposes into three periods:
1988-1994 (220 advertisements), 1995-2001 (68 advertisements), and 2002-2007 (186
advertisements).
We used content analysis to evaluate each of the advertisements collected

(Abernathy and Franke, 1996). To codify the information contained in each
advertisement, we designed a special coding protocol, comprising five major sections:
advertiser’s profile (i.e. company name, location country, organization type, and
economic activity); targeting features (i.e. products advertised, target audience, product
cycle, and level of greenness); message aspects (i.e. type of environmental claim, claim
specificity, claim emphasis, and claim validity); copy characteristics (i.e. headline
structure, headline format, body copy mode, and body copy tone); and situation points
(i.e. illustration setting, illustration presenter, company identification mark, and
product identification mark).
The coding protocol contained constructs and items that other scholars have used
mainly 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 prior
research has not tackled on the subject. To make the protocol more comprehensive
70
60
Number of advertisements
50
40
30
20
10
0
Figure 1.
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
00
01
02
03
04
05
06
07
Frequency of international
19
19
19
19
19
19
19
19
19
19
19
19
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
20
Years
green advertisements
by year
Source: The Economist (January 1988-December 2007)
IMR and provide a common frame of reference in coding the advertisements, we prepared a
28,1 special manual that incorporated operational definitions, explanations, and examples
for each construct/item. Before the full-scale coding process, we tested the coding
protocol using a small sample of advertisements; this revealed only minor corrections
to improve its workability.
The two researchers who previously identified the green advertisements, undertook
12 the coding, under the supervision of the principal investigator. The coders had
appropriate educational levels, experiential background, and familiarity with the
subject. Both coders underwent rigorous training, in which the general purpose
and objectives of the coding exercise were clarified; the constructs and items included
in the coding manual were analysed, and the way the coding protocol needed to be
administered was fully explained. Coders also participated in a short coding exercise
to ensure that the process was clearly understood. After training, each coder received
the full set of advertisements and transferred the information contained in each
independently onto coding forms.

With the completion of the coding task, each coder returned all completed forms
to the principal investigator, who subsequently carried out an inter-coder reliability
analysis (Holsti, 1969). This analysis revealed a satisfactory level of agreement in the
two coding attempts, ranging from 91 percent for some items (e.g. advertising
greenness) to 100 percent for others (e.g. advertiser characteristics). The principal
investigator and the two coders discussed and collectively resolved the coding
disagreements and, in some ambivalent cases, the opinion of an expert in the field
was sought. The data contained in the final coding forms were subsequently entered
for statistical analysis, including total percentage frequencies, partial percentage
frequencies, chi-square (w2) test, and post hoc tests because of the nominal nature of the
data collected.
Research findings
In this section, we discuss the study’s findings in terms of each research objective—
namely, advertiser profile, targeting features, message aspects, copy characteristics, and
situation points. To better understand the changes in these advertising dimensions over
time, the Appendix (Table AI) provides a list of the key events related to environmental
issues that took place worldwide during the investigation period. At the end of the
section, we discuss the interaction effects between the advertising dimensions examined.
Advertiser profile
A 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, typically
handle products that greatly depend on natural resources and/or whose consumption
seriously affects the environment. Notably, the green advertising pattern varied
significantly by period, with ABB (w2 ¼ 21.42, p ¼ 0.000), BASF (w2 ¼ 27.19, p ¼ 0.000),
and Shell (w2 ¼ 13.92, p ¼ 0.001) holding the leading positions in the periods 1988-1994,
1995-2001, and 2002-2007, respectively. With a few exceptions, this reflects a rather
reactive approach to green advertising, often driven by situation-specific factors. For
example, the excessive amount of Degussa’s advertisements in the late 1990s could be
Time period Green
(I) (II) (III) advertising
Total 1988-1994 1995-2001 2002-2007
Advertiser profile (n ¼ 473)% (n1 ¼ 219)% (n2 ¼ 68)% (n3 ¼ 186)% w2 p-value Scheffé’s test practices
Company name
Shell
Asea Brown Boveri (ABB)
7.0
5.7
2.3
11.0
10.3
2.9
10.8
0.5
13.92
21.42
0.001
0.000
IIXI, IIIXI
IXII, IXIII
13
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 Table I.
Services 19.9 23.3 8.8 19.9 6.82 0.033 IXII, IIIXII Advertiser profile of
Mining 16.5 12.3 1.5 26.9 28.45 0.000 IXII, IIIXII, IIIXI international green
Agriculture 6.3 10.9 1.4 2.7 14.76 0.001 IXII, IXIII advertisements
IMR attributed to the firm’s adoption of new environmental strategies and the introduction
28,1 of sound environmental management systems.
Almost all green advertisements examined were sponsored by firms located in
the developed parts of the world, particularly Europe, the United States, and Japan.
In total, nine countries (among the most economically advanced) accounted for 92.5
percent of the green advertisements examined. Overall, German firms had the leading
14 position 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
(w2 ¼ 34.45, p ¼ 0.000) and Switzerland (w2 ¼ 17.94, p ¼ 0.000) were in the lead during
the 1988-1994 period, but their advertising activity dropped sharply in the
2002-2007 period. The reverse trend occurred in the case of the United Kingdom
(w2 ¼ 4.69, p ¼ 0.094) and the USA (w2 ¼ 22.95, p ¼ 0.000), which in the last period
were the most frequent green advertisers. This change in the green advertising scene
could reflect increasing demands by local and regional stakeholders for more
environmental initiatives, as well as international criticism received by US and British
firms for not conforming to environmental standards (Polonsky et al., 1997). The
same holds true for Japanese companies, which have also tried to enhance their green
image recently.
The overwhelming majority (93.4 percent) of the sponsors of green advertisements
were manufacturing firms, which took the lead throughout the investigation period.
This can be justified because these firms are more likely to damage the environment
through their resource use (e.g. energy consumption), production processes (e.g. toxic
emissions), or the products they manufacture (e.g. non-biodegradable). Suppliers of
raw materials composed the second major advertising group, accounting for 19.0
percent of the total advertisements. Again, the activities of these firms have a direct
impact on the environment, especially regarding the extraction of non-renewable
raw materials and the environmental pollution caused by processing them. Green
advertising activity by other types of firms was minimal, and this aimed primarily
toward communicating the green character of some of their services, as in the case
of financial organizations offering risk assessment of environmental projects to
corporate clients. Green advertisements sponsored by either government or non-profit
organizations were almost non-existent. In rare cases, these advertisements were
usually aimed at raising public concern on environmental problems.
Most of the firms involved in green advertising were big conglomerate
organizations, consisting of multiple strategic business units and producing a wide
range of products. Approximately, four-fifths (81.0 percent) of the advertisers
were engaged in the production of industrial goods (e.g. chemicals), and another
third (33.2 percent) were manufacturers of products directed to the consumer market
(e.g. automobiles). These are basically firms with products that have often been
accused of harmfully affecting the environment. Organizations belonging to the
services sector accounted for one-fifth (19.9 percent) of the advertisements, whose
focus was on communicating their environment-led services and/or sensitizing people
to the potential consequences of ecological problems. Firms related to the mining and
agricultural sectors had the smallest share, being responsible for 16.5 and 6.3 percent
of the advertisements, respectively. However, while advertising activity by mining
companies was more evident in the period 2002-2007 (w2 ¼ 28.45, p ¼ 0.000), the reverse
was true for agricultural-related firms, which advertised more during the first period
(w2 ¼ 14.76, p ¼ 0.001).
Targeting features Green
The most frequent products appearing in green advertisements were energy-related advertising
(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). Advertisements practices
from both categories were more evident during the 2002-2007 period (representing
32.8 and 16.1 percent of the total, respectively). Advertisements focusing on metal
products, machinery, and non-metallic goods accounted for 9.5 percent of the total and 15
were mainly shown during the early stages of the investigation period (w2 ¼ 23.17,
p ¼ 0.000). Two other categories that also attracted attention, albeit to a lesser extent,
pertained to renewable technology and environment-related services. Other product
categories were advertised on a much more limited basis, though some notable
variations existed in their advertising pattern. For example, business services were
advertised more in the first period (w2 ¼ 9.10, p ¼ 0.001), chemicals and plastic products
Time period
(I) (II) (III)
Total 1988-1994 1995-2001 2002-2007
Targeting feature (n ¼ 473)% (n1 ¼ 219)% (n2 ¼ 68)% (n3 ¼ 186)% w2 p-value Scheffé’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 Table II.

Deep 41.9 38.8 38.2 46.8 3.05 0.218 Targeting features of
Moderate 29.4 26.5 27.9 33.3 2.35 0.308 international green
Shallow 28.7 34.7 33.9 19.9 11.77 0.003 IIXIII, IXIII advertisements
IMR in the second (w2 ¼ 7.49, p ¼ 0.024), and public administration/public services in the
28,1 third (w2 ¼ 14.16, p ¼ 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 years
of the period under investigation the emphasis was on the business market (w2 ¼ 16.28,
p ¼ 0.000), more recent advertisements placed greater emphasis on consumer buyers
16 (w2 ¼ 33.01, p ¼ 0.000). That is, 59.1 percent of the advertisements published during
the 2002-2007 period targeted consumers, compared with 25.8 percent with a
business-to-business orientation. To some extent, this can be explained by the
increasing awareness of ecological issues by consumers in many countries (particularly
in the developed part of the world) and the concomitant escalation of demand for
environmentally friendly versions of products and services (The Cooperative Bank,
2007). Another one-fifth (20.4 percent) of the advertisements targeted both consumers
and 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 (w2 ¼ 5.74, p ¼ 0.057).
About three-fifths (60.6 percent) of the advertisements stressed the consumption
side of the advertiser’s products, focusing on ecological attributes related to the use of
products/services (e.g. recycling, energy savings); in contrast, 28.6 percent highlighted
production-related issues such as ecological friendliness aspects of production inputs
and processes (e.g. advanced ecologically friendly technology, sustainable raw
materials, and environmental expert advice on processes). However, while the former
group of advertisements experienced an upward trend over time (w2 ¼ 14.40, p ¼ 0.001),
the reverse was true for the latter (w2 ¼ 28.40, p ¼ 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 which
a green advertisement explicitly states the environmental behaviour of the advertiser.
Of the advertisements examined, 41.9 percent were considered “deep”, that is, provided
extensive hints about the firm’s environmental practices (e.g. statistical figures
indicating environmental efficiency improvement). Another 29.4 percent had
“moderate” greenness, that is, did not focus on topics related to the environment
per se, but rather mentioned specific issues (e.g. a description of recycling methods
or 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 the
2002-2007 period. To some extent, this mirrors the growing pressures stakeholder
groups in many countries put on firms to show proof of their environment-protection
practices.
Message aspects
Following Carlson et al. (1993), we classified environmental claims contained in
advertising 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, appeared
in more than half (52.2 percent) the advertisements. Some examples included low
product emissions, product durability, low energy consumption, and product recycling.
Process-oriented claims, which are related to the company’s green internal technology
Time period Green
Total 1988-1994 1995-2001 2002-2007
Message aspect (n ¼ 473)% (n1 ¼ 219)% (n2 ¼ 68)% (n3 ¼ 186)% w2 p-value Scheffé’s test practices
Claim type
Product-oriented
Process-oriented
52.2
26.6
50.2
32.4
45.6
7.4
57.0
26.9
3.24
16.69
0.198
0.000 IXII, IIIXII
17
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 Table III.
Ambiguous 30.2 37.4 33.8 20.4 14.29 0.001 IIXIII, IXIII Message aspects of
Omission 8.0 12.8 4.4 3.8 12.49 0.002 IXIII international green
False/lie 3.2 0.5 – 7.5 18.97 0.000 IIIXII, IIIXI advertisements
and production methods, were identified in just 26.6 percent of the advertisements.
These claims included emphasis on low toxic emissions, low energy use, and
non-polluting production processes. Image-oriented claims such as preserving the
ecosystem, maintaining natural resources, and reducing the greenhouse effect,
were less common. Finally, claims related to environmental facts such as stressing the
issue of increasing levels of global warming, were the least employed.
With regard to the specificity of environmental claims, 62.3 percent of the
advertisements made specific claims (i.e. claims with a clear meaning, usually
accompanied by detailed information). A case in point is the following claim made
by the energy company ENEL in 2005: “We are working to reduce CO2 emissions to
zero. In the last five years we have already reduced them by 17 percent”. The remaining
advertisements made vague claims (i.e. phrases too broad to have a distinct meaning)
such as “we respect the environment”, “environmentally sound”, and “ecologically
friendly”. Notably, the proportion of advertisements incorporating specific claims
increased dramatically over time, from 53.9 percent in 1988-1994 to 73.0 percent in
2002-2007.
More than half the advertisements had a strong claim emphasis – that is,
environment-related issues were highlighted as of primary significance, in contrast
to traditional benefit-creating attributes (Manrai et al., 1997). For example, Toyota’s
“zero emission advertisement” in 2007 announced to the public its environmental
beliefs, incentives, and targets for the future, without, however, referring to any other
attribute. We observed weak emphasis on environmental aspects in the remainder of
advertisements (i.e. 43.9 percent), and these typically presented environmental
IMR friendliness as an extra minor attribute influencing the product/service value offer.
28,1 For example, in a 1990 advertisement, Volvo revealed the benefits of buying its
760 series, which, in addition to greater safety, enhanced comfort, and improved
technology, offered environmental friendliness. In terms of claim emphasis, we
observed that advertisements published at the beginning of the examination period
had a predominantly weak claim emphasis (w2 ¼ 13.76, p ¼ 0.001), while in later
18 advertisements, emphasis on environmental aspects became increasingly stronger
(w2 ¼ 13.76, p ¼ 0.001).
We evaluated the validity of the environmental claims made using Kangun
et al.’s (1991) quadruple typology: acceptable, i.e. advertisements with no false
claims 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 they
are true; and false/lying, i.e. inaccurate or untruthful declarations. Of these,
acceptable claims accounted for 58.6 percent of the advertisements, followed by
ambiguous claims (30.2 percent of the advertisements). Claims characterized by

omissions or false/lying appeared in 8.0 and 3.2 percent of the advertisements,
respectively. Advertisements increasingly incorporated acceptable claims in their
messages (w2 ¼ 15.24, p ¼ 0.000), rather than ambiguous and omission claims,
which experienced a downward trend (w2 ¼ 14.29, p ¼ 0.001; w2 ¼ 12.49, p ¼ 0.002,
respectively). Our assessment also revealed an increase in false/lying claims,
which reached 7.6 percent during the 2002-2007 period (w2 ¼ 18.97, p ¼ 0.000), which
is in line with findings of an event report recently produced by the British Advertising
Standards Authority (2008). To some extent, this finding is attributed to some
automobile manufacturers reporting that their cars were environmentally friendly
when, in reality, they were not and even exceeded average acceptable industry
standards.
Copy characteristics
The most commonly employed headline (and subheading) structure in the
advertisements had a declarative form (75.7 percent); that is, they provided a
statement 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 advertiser
and/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. Just
6.6 percent of the advertisements employed slogans (e.g. Bayer’s “expertise with
responsibility”). Some advertisements also used statistics in their headlines as a means
of dramatizing the consequences of ecological problems. Other types of headline
structure such as quotation, selective, and negative, were rarely used. A trend we
observed here is the reduced use of identification headlines (w2 ¼ 7.85, p ¼ 0.020) and
slogans (w2 ¼ 6.90, p ¼ 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 entire
investigation period. Degussa’s (1999) headline, “working together to protect the
environment”, provides a good example in this respect. Next (12.3 percent of the
advertisements) were headlines that stressed the environmentally friendly nature of
the product’s features (e.g. LEXUS’s (2006) advertisement “the world’s first
performance hybrid sedan”), though their use experienced a declining trend (w2 ¼
13.58, p ¼ 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
Time period Green
Copy Total 1988-1994 1995-2001 2002-2007
characteristic (n ¼ 473)% (n1 ¼ 219)% (n2 ¼ 68)% (n3 ¼ 186)% w2 p-value Scheffé’s test practices
Headline/subheading structure
Declarative
Identification
75.7
18.6
73.5
23.7
72.0
17.6
79.6
12.9
2.57
7.85
0.276
0.020 IXIII
19
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 Table IV.

Rational 99.7 100.0 97.0 99.4 0.69 0.710 Copy characteristics of
Emotional 34.2 37.9 26.5 32.8 3.30 0.192 international green
Ethical/moral 29.4 31.5 25.0 28.5 1.18 0.555 advertisements
in the company and/or its products. Other types of headline format such as
consultative, feelings, and testimonial, were also infrequently used.
Body copy appeared in many different modes, with half (50.1 percent) the
advertisements giving a description of key issues that might linger in the reader’s
mind (e.g. “Do you see a tree? At Veolia we see an industrial challenge”). This was
closely followed by an explanation mode (47.8 percent of the advertisements), which
mainly provided details about environmental problems unknown to the reader, as
well as information about the environmentally friendly character of the company
and its products. For example, a General Electric advertisement in 2005 argues that
“by developing advanced technologies in energy, manufacturing, and infrastructure,
IMR we can create solutions that are as economically advantageous as they are ecologically
28,1 sound”. Technical expertise was employed in two-fifths of the advertisements, mainly
to demonstrate the company’s ability to protect the environment such as “we have
the know-how to biologically treat your waste water”. Another 37.0 percent of the
advertisements had a factual mode – that is, they provided various facts that enhanced
the ecological profile of the advertiser. Advertisements used persuasion (e.g. Dupont’s
20 advertisement in 1990 saying that “Tynek is easily recycled or disposed of, with
no adverse environmental effects”) or statistics (e.g. “at YARA we are geared to reduce
our emissions by 25 percent before 2008”) less frequently. Some notable tendencies
regarding body copy modes are the increasing adoption of description (w2 ¼ 93.78,
p ¼ 0.000) and statistics (w2 ¼ 33.23, p ¼ 0.000) and the declining use of explanation
(w2 ¼ 96.07, p ¼ 0.000), technical expertise (w2 ¼ 47.47, p ¼ 0.000), and facts (w2 ¼ 11.98,
p ¼ 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 of
declarative comments about the direct benefits the company’s methods and products
contributed to the environment (e.g. “TOTAL was the first oil company to produce
and market biofuels”) and, to a lesser extent, their efficiency (e.g. “since 1992, Chevron
has reduced its own energy consumption by 24 percent”) or quality (e.g. “BP’s ultimate
fuels help vehicles deliver more performance and less pollution”) aspects. An
emotional tone was employed in 34.2 percent of the advertisements, and this usually
stressed either pleasure (e.g. “Toyota Prius delivers impressive environmental
performance and driving pleasure”), or pride (e.g. “the latest Shell report allows
you 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 of
the advertisements had an ethical/moral tone, which typically took a positive stance
as to what is moral, ethical, or right. A case in point is Linde Group’s advertisement
in 2006, which states that “we take our products from nature and that’s why we have a
particular responsibility toward the environment”.
Situation points
The green advertisements also used a wide range of illustrations. Advertisements
showing a natural environment represented 27.9 percent of the total, though a serious
decline occurred during the 2002-2007 period (w2 ¼ 27.32, p ¼ 0.000) (see Table V). Some
popular scenes here included a blue sky, a tree in a field, a blue sea, a green forest, and
flowers or birds. Still life illustrations, which presented mainly pictures of products
(e.g. cars, airplanes, machine equipment), appeared in 13.9 percent advertisements and
were more evident in the last two periods (w2 ¼ 7.97, p ¼ 0.019). In about the same
proportion, advertisements also employed imaginary or artificial scenes as in the case
of Vattenfall’s advertisement, which shows a lion hunting penguins in a dried-up,
tropical region, were also employed in about the same proportion. Approximately, 12.6
percent of the advertisements adopted an industrial environment setting, particularly
in the case of advertisers producing heavy industrial goods. Some advertisements also
opted 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), and
environmental objects (e.g. plastic bottles or aluminium containers).
More than half (57.5 percent) the advertisements did not include a presenter in their
illustrations. Of the remainder, the presence of ordinary people was the most common,
often shown individually or in association with other people with similar
Time period Green
Total 1988-1994 1995-2001 2002-2007
Situation point (n ¼ 473)% (n1 ¼ 219)% (n2 ¼ 68)% (n3 ¼ 186)% w2 p-value Scheffé’s test practices
Illustration setting
Natural environment
Still life
27.9
13.9
36.5
9.1
36.7
19.1
14.5
17.7
27.32
7.97
0.000
0.019
IIXIII, IXIII
IIXI, IIIXI
21
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 Table V.
Green trademark 0.2 – 1.4 – 5.97 0.051 Situation points of
No product environmental international green
identification 95.4 98.1 98.6 90.8 13.94 0.001 IIXIII, IXIII advertisements
characteristics (e.g. men, women, children). Animals constituted the second-largest

category, shown in 9.5 percent of the advertisements, and their presence was the
highest during the 1988-1994 period (w2 ¼ 11.97, p ¼ 0.003). Altogether, 40 different
animals appeared in advertisements, with mammals comprising the biggest group (19),
IMR followed by birds (nine), insects (six), amphibians (three), and fish (three). The most
28,1 frequently shown animals were ducks, trout, and butterflies, each appearing in three
different advertisements. A company person appeared in 5.7 percent of the
advertisements; this person usually had the status of a top executive, engineer, or
scientist within the organization. A small proportion of advertisements introduced
special characters such as Opel’s teddy bear, which appeared in a 1992 advertisement
22 that showed the bear as the only thing left after cars are recycled. Experts were rarely
shown, and if so, they aimed to confirm the firm’s commitment to save the environment
or emphasized the firm’s environmental expertise.
Two-thirds (66.6 percent) of the advertisements contained no identification mark
associated with the green status of the company. Of those that did, the most commonly
used was an “environmental website”, which provided additional information about
the firm’s environmental practices and educated consumers on environmental matters.
As expected, the use of environmental websites was more prevalent in more recent
advertisements (due to the emergence of the Internet as a communication medium

in the late 1990s). Environmental slogans such as BP’s “beyond petroleum”, AEG’s
“our future demands responsibility”, and Boeing’s “making airport communities
quieter communities”, appeared in just 8.8 percent of the advertisements. Other forms
of identification marks such as the green signature cut (e.g. Waste Management
Europe), green logotype (e.g. the black-and-white panda above the WWF sign), and
green awards (e.g. Rolex laureate award for people making exceptional contributions to
the environment) were rare.
The use of green product identification marks was even more infrequent among
the advertisements examined, with only 4.6 percent displaying such marks. Legal
environmental logos, indicating that the product met minimum required industry
standards, appeared in just 2.3 percent of the advertisements. These advertisements
were mainly sponsored by automobile firms, which have recently been obliged to
provide more information about their cars’ CO2 emissions. Environmental certification
appeared in 2.1 percent of the advertisements, the most commonly cited being ISO
9002, Energy Star, and Energy Efficiency Scheme (later renamed Carbon Trust
Standard). Finally, the use of green trademarks (i.e. company signs symbolizing
an environmental aspect) appeared in only one advertisement, namely that of
SANYO in 1995, which shows the planet earth with a mark indicating the eco-friendly
nature of the firm’s refrigerators. The negligible use of green trademarks can be
attributed to the newness of this phenomenon in the last few years and, though many
firms now widely embrace these trademarks, usually some time must elapse before
legislative bodies approve them and firms subsequently include them in
advertisements.
Interaction effects
In addition to identifying differences in international green advertisements over
time, we focus on specific interaction effects among the key issues examined. With
regard to advertiser profile, we found that some companies adopted distinctive
environmental patterns that deviated from the norm. For example, BP and Bayer
showed greater sensitivity toward environmental issues by making more specific,
strong, and acceptable claims than the other firms examined. In addition, international
companies from the UK or USA tended to have greener advertisements than
those based in other countries, probably reflecting their stricter environmental
regulations.
We also found differences in environmental advertisements in the case of Green
targeting features. For example, while automobiles/airplanes/trains, chemicals/ advertising
plastic products, and paper products/printing and publishing had vaguer and more
ambiguous green advertisements, the opposite was true for renewable technology and practices
environmental-related services. Our analysis also found that the greener the
advertisement, the stronger, more specific, and more acceptable the ecological
claim made. 23
With regard to message aspects, the greener the advertisement, the more evident
was 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, automobile
manufacturers placed greater emphasis on product-oriented claims, environmentally
related services used more process-oriented claims, agriculture/forestry/fishing
organizations used more image-oriented claims, while energy firms mainly
employed environmental fact-based claims. The analysis also indicated that weak
environmental claims were vaguer than those with a strong emphasis and high
specificity. Claim validity was also significantly associated with the specificity and
emphasis of the claim: acceptable claims were more prevalent in advertisements
with high specificity and strong emphasis, while claims with more ambiguity,
omissions, and falsehoods/lies were mainly connected with advertisements with
greater vagueness and weaker emphasis.
In the case of copy characteristics, headlines/subheadings containing declaration,
identification, or statistics were associated more with automobiles, waterworks and
supply, and energy, respectively. Our analysis also indicated certain distinctive
patterns with regard to headline format: while the use of “testimonials” was more
common in advertisements with deep greenness and high specificity/strength,
the reverse was true with regard to “news”. Advertisements with factual and
persuasive body copy were related more to strong, specific, and acceptable claims.
Finally, the deeper the greenness of the advertisement, the more ethical the body copy
tone was.
With regard to situation points, illustration settings exhibiting natural
environments were more profound in advertisements related to energy and
automobiles, perhaps in a way to soften their harmful effects on the environment.
Advertisements showing industrial environments contained claims of greater
vagueness and ambiguity. Use of company personnel was more obvious in relation
to electricity supply, paper products, and business services, while the use of animals
appeared more in advertisements pertaining to agriculture/forestry/fishing,
waterworks and supply, and mines. The use of both environmental websites and
environmental slogans was associated more with advertisements making strong,
specific, and acceptable claims, and the same pattern occurred with regard to
environmental certification.
Summary and conclusions

From this study, we can conclude that the international green advertising scene
has changed dramatically during the past two decades on many different fronts.
For example, with regard to advertiser profile, we observed a growing appreciation by
international firms of the role of advertising in developing a green image. This is
particularly true of large multinational corporations in industries often accused of
polluting the environment. However, most of these firms exhibited an irregular green
IMR advertising pattern, reflecting a reactive response to external and/or internal events
28,1 related to the environment. From a country perspective, we also noted different, but
changing, patterns in green advertising, with US and British firms gradually taking
the 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
24 (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 to
alleviate (and, in some cases, mask) environmental accusations made against them by
various parties. Our study also shows that there is a gradual shift of emphasis in green
advertising from business to consumer buyers, stressing the growing importance
of environmental marketing in consumer markets. In addition, the tendency in green
advertisements to increasingly stress issues related to consumption, rather than
production, aspects of the product cycle highlights advertisers’ response to increasing

criticism about product emission levels, recycling problems, and after-product life
solutions. The trend observed to increase the amount of detail in green advertisements
could mirror:
. the heavy investment made by many firms in environmental equipment and
processes;
. the need to differentiate from the competition by communicating a green image
to current and prospective buyers; and
. the multiplicity of environment-related problems, requiring more extensive
and 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’ tendency
to enhance green claims that are more easily observable, clearly understood, and
practically useful for protecting the environment. In addition, firms’ inclination to
design messages that are more specific and detailed on environmental matters, place
stronger emphasis on the environment, and contain less ambiguity, expresses a more
responsible approach to green advertising. To a great extent, this could be attributed
to repeated accusations made against several firms by regulatory bodies (e.g. Federal
Trade 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, while
body copy adopted mainly a descriptive mode and a rational tone. These findings show
that 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 from
the adoption of green methods and procedures;
. emphasize the firm’s environmental activities, which allows buyers to draw
comparisons with “non-green” competitors; and
. stress the importance and seriousness of the topic for the company and all
stakeholders involved.
Situation points of green advertising also reflected the idiosyncratic nature of Green
environmental issues. For example, illustrations mainly showed external environment- advertising
focused scenes, whether natural, artificial, or industrial. One striking result is the
complete absence of presenters in more than half of green advertisements. However, in practices
cases 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 dimensions
of green advertising, illustration characteristics did not reveal any clear-cut tendency. 25
With the exception of environmental websites, identification marks associated with
green characteristics were virtually absent. To some extent, this could be due to the
time 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 the
different dimensions of the advertisements (i.e. advertiser profile, targeting features,
message aspects, copy characteristics, and situation points). For example, the
advertiser and the country in which it is based seem to determine the design and
the execution of international green advertisements. The nature of the products
advertised also had an important effect on the message, copy, and situation points of
green advertisements. Some strong inter-relationships among the items of each
advertising dimension also existed, as in the case of deep green advertisements, which
were associated with specific, strong, and acceptable claims.
Managerial implications
The role of international green advertising in communicating a firm’s environmentally
friendly practices to various audiences is important. This study shows that
international organizations with a long and successful presence in the market have
used 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 green
advertising, rather than merely reacting to internal crisis situations, ecological
disasters, or environmental public criticisms. Green advertising should be regarded as
an indispensable part of the firm’s overall environmental marketing strategy that can
help 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 cautious
handling to achieve maximum effectiveness. Therefore, firms should formulate an
advertising strategy that considers various stakeholders’ environmental concerns, and
subsequently should turn these into reasons for making the company more attractive
than its competitors. However, our study showed that, to win the credibility and
trust of both consumers and stakeholders, a firm’s environmental claims should
be detailed, specific, and truthful. This is particularly relevant today because of
repeated accusations of misleading green advertising claims.
This study shows that green advertising is not static but rather is constantly
evolving as a result of changes in firms’ internal and external forces. Therefore, it is
important to carefully monitor trends in the market, and adopt ideas from best practice
in the field (e.g. Advertising Standards Authority’s guidelines for environmental
claims). Firms also need to foresee future developments with regard to environmental
issues 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.
IMR The multifarious nature of the international green advertisements examined
28,1 stresses the need to design different environmental advertising campaigns targeted
at groups of buyers with different environmental involvement. For example, although
an increasing number of buyers choose products by relying solely on their
environmental credentials, firms should take extra care to attract the attention of
people who tend to ignore environmental claims by conveying advertising messages
26 that combine green attributes (e.g. recyclable packaging) with other product attributes
(e.g. quality).
Limitations and future research

The 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 of
the content analysis method used to evaluate international green advertisements, we
could 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 of
the heterogeneity, complexity, and volatility of the international business environment,
it is crucial to understand the specific conditions surrounding green advertising. It
would also be beneficial to trace whether green advertisements were designed in
response to external stakeholders or were the result of firms’ proactive environmental
behaviour (Polonsky and Hyman, 2007).
Second, the content analysis did not enable us to measure the communication
effectiveness of green advertisements. It is vital to understand the opinion of the
audiences targeted by these advertisements directly in terms of the degree of
involvement, likability, and persuasion. It would also be insightful if the results of this
survey were combined with the characteristics (e.g. environmental claims, execution
styles, presentation types) of the green advertisements extracted from the analysis
undertaken. This would also help identify the exact profile (e.g. demographic,
psychographic, behavioural) of the people targeted and better understand their
requirements with regard to the design, execution, and presentation of environmental
advertisements.
Third, it might be useful to combine the information collected for this study with
secondary data pertaining to the performance of the specific company/product
advertised. 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 green
advertisement are conducive to superior market and/or financial performance;
and
(3) identify potential moderating effects on the link between advertising
characteristics and company performance.
Although our study covered a wide array of issues pertaining to international
advertising, other important dimensions warrant attention such as the degree of a
firm’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 environmental
claims (Hartmann and Apaolaza-Ibáñez, 2009), the level of consistency between
international green claims and actual environmental marketing behaviour (Polonsky Green
et al., 1997), and the impact of home country environmental values on international advertising
green advertising implementation (Rugman and Verbeke, 1998).
The focus of our study was on a single international advertising medium, The practices
Economist. Thus, further research might incorporate additional international
magazines, as well as draw comparisons between green advertisements appearing
in international business magazines and those in international consumer magazines. 27
Subsequent research should also extend its investigation on green advertisements to
other international advertising media, such as television, radio, and the Internet.
Our study focused exclusively on international green advertisements, though
further research could examine their effectiveness in comparison with non-green
advertisements. In this context, it would also be useful to determine whether
consumers in different countries consider environmental claims more convincing than
product performance claims when making their purchasing decisions. Further
research might also determine whether green or non-green advertisements are more
effective among buyers who are environmentally conscious than among buyers who
have low sensitivity toward ecological issues. It would also be worthwhile to examine
the nature and effectiveness of ethical, social and environmental advertising claims in
different cultural settings (Polonsky and Jevons, 2009; Mögele and Tropp, 2010).
The legal and regulatory climate prevailing in a country sets the boundaries within
which firms formulate their green advertisements (Welch and Wilkinson, 2004). As
such, it would be useful to examine how this influences the way firms communicate
their environmental commitment in foreign markets (Carlson et al., 1996). Furthermore,
various regulatory and self-regulatory organizations have repeatedly requested greater
clarity of environmental claims in green advertisements (Polonsky et al., 1997). Future
research could investigate how organizations in various countries evaluate the veracity
of the claims made, a well as determine their role in adjusting green advertisements of
international firms across countries.
Finally, it would be illuminating to identify how a firm’s green advertising strategy
differs relative to its approach to foreign markets such as its international strategic
perspective (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 could
draw comparisons between international firms located in developed countries and
those originating from emerging economies (Yin and Ma, 2009). Differences in green
advertising practices could also be identified according to whether the foreign market
is mature or developing.
Notes
1. We attributed the inconsistencies observed in selecting the remaining advertisements to
several factors:
. they included technical terms that were of a general nature rather than providing specific
or relevant environmental claims;
. they referred to corporate social responsibility issues, without making a clear focus on
environmental matters;
. they presented natural environments, without making any particular reference to green
issues and/or sustainability; and
. they were more or less the same as other advertisements published in previous periods,
with only slight differences.
IMR 2. To a great extent, this advertising pattern comes as a response to specific environmental
events that marked the world society. For example, during the 1988-1994 period,
28,1 the Environmental Assessment Directive was implemented across Europe, the
inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change was established, and the UN Conference on
Environment 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, probably
because of elevated fears that green positioning was becoming an anti-issue, increasing
28 concerns 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, when
intense political discussion and revived consumer interest re-emerged as a result of events
such as the UN World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg, the publication
of the first Environmental Performance Index, and the initiation of reviews of green
marketing guidelines and environmental products (Visser, 2009).
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Appendix Green
advertising
Year Event Nature
practices
1988 Implementation across Europe of Environmental Policy initiatives

Assessment Directive 31
1988 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Climate change
established
1988 Assassination of the well known ecological activist Chico Crisis event
Mendez
1989 Exxon Valdez disaster in Alaska Crisis event
1990 Principle of integrated pollution control in United Kingdom Policy initiatives
Environmental Protection Act
1990 London Agreement on ozone depletion material phase out Policy initiatives
1990 Defeat of California “big green” environmental legislation; Green opposition
local adoption of many aspects
1990 1st IPCC report finds 0.51C warming Climate change
1991 Proposal for European Environmental Agency Policy initiatives
1991 Draft Eco-Audit Directive, Europe Policy initiatives
1991 Petrobras P36 oil platform sinks off Brazilian coast Crisis event
1992 In opposition to local environmental regulation, many Green opposition
California companies in deep recession threaten removal to
less regulated states
1992 GATT publishes report on world free trade and Policy initiatives
environmental issues
1992 UN Conference on Environment and Development (the World summits; Climate
“Earth Summit”) in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil change
1992 UN Environmental Programme (UNEP) Banking Initiative Industry initiatives
launched
1992 The Business Council for Sustainable Development Industry initiatives
publishes Changing Course
1992 FTC publishes green marketing guidelines for the first time Practice guidelines
1993 Forrest Stewardship Council (FSC) established Industry initiatives
1993 Eco-Management and Audit Scheme (EMAS) enacted by the Codes and standards
EU
1994 Green Globe standard for travel and tourism launched Industry initiatives
1995 Shell Brent Spar and Nigeria crises Crisis event
1995 Second IPCC report predicts significant socioeconomic Climate change
impacts
1996 ISO 14001 environmental management standard launched Codes and standards
1996 FTC revises green marketing guidelines Practice guidelines
1997 Kyoto Protocol sets targets for 34 major economies (enforced Climate change
in 2005 and ratified by 187 states by 2009)
1997 Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) established Industry initiatives
1997 UN Environmental Programme (UNEP) Insurance Industry Industry initiatives
Initiative (III) formed
1997 Fair trade standard launched internationally Codes and standards Table AI.
1997 Asian ecological and financial chaos Crisis event Landmark events related
1998 Oil pipeline explosion at Jesse, Nigeria Crisis event to environmental issues
1998 Cement Sustainability Initiative launched Industry initiatives during the 1988-2007
(continued) period
IMR Year Event Nature
28,1
1998 FTC revises green marketing guidelines Practice guidelines
2000 Mining and Minerals for Sustainable Development (MMSD) Industry initiatives
project started
2000 GRI Sustainability Reporting Guidelines launched Codes and Standards
32 2000 Carbon Disclosure Project established Sustainability reporting
2000 Environmental Sustainability index first published State of the planet
2001 Third IPCC report shows rising temperatures and sea levels Climate change
2002 UN World Summit on Sustainable Development (the “Earth World summits
Summit þ 10” in Johannesburg, South Africa
2003 Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil created Industry initiatives
2004 Gas explosion in Daping coal mine in Henan province in Crisis event
China
2005 EU GHG Emission Trading Scheme begins trading Climate change

2005 Millennium Ecosystem Assessment published State of the planet
2005 Corporate Leaders Group on Climate Change issues first Leadership initiatives
open letter
2006 Stern Review on Economics of Climate Change published Climate change
2006 ISO 14064 standard on GHG accounting and verification Codes and standards
launched
2006 Environmental Performance Index first published State of the planet
2007 Fourth IPCC report shows 90% certainty of human cause of Climate change
climate change
2007 FTC initiates review of green marketing guidelines and Practice guidelines
environmental products, including carbon offsets
Table AI. Source: Compiled from Peattie (1995, 2001), IISD (2010), and Visser (2009)
About the authors

Leonidas C. Leonidou (PhD, MSc, University of Bath) is a Professor of Marketing at the School of
Economics and Management of the University of Cyprus. His current research interests are in the
areas of international marketing/purchasing, relationship marketing, strategic marketing, and
marketing in emerging economies. He has published extensively in these fields and his articles
appear 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 main
research interests focus on sustainability, international marketing, consumer behaviour, and
advertising. 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 in
Marketing at Leeds University Business School, University of Leeds, UK. His research interests
are mainly in international marketing, electronic marketing, and relationship marketing. He has Green
published in various journals, including the European Journal of Marketing, Journal of
Advertising Research, and International Marketing Review.
advertising
Magnus Hultman (PhD, MSc, Luleå University of Technology) is a Lecturer in Marketing at practices
Leeds University Business School, University of Leeds, UK. Although his research centres on
international marketing strategy and export performance, he writes on a range of topics
including electronic supply chain management, marketing communications, and brand 33
management. His research has appeared in journals such as Journal of International
Marketing and Tourism Management among others.
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Review of green advertising literature

In general, studies focusing on green washing revealed some degree of misleadingness

subsequently augmented with additional levels of greenness, such as the

We used content analysis to evaluate each of the advertisements collected

independently onto coding forms.

Opel 2.1 3.7 2.9 – 6.75 0.034 IXIII

Degree of greenness Table II.

ambiguous claims (30.2 percent of the advertisements). Claims characterized by

subheading 3.4 4.1 2.9 2.7 0.67 0.716

Body copy mode

Body copy tone Table IV.

Green lifestyle 3.4 2.2 1.4 5.4 3.83 0.147

Company identification mark

Product identification mark

characteristics (e.g. men, women, children). Animals constituted the second-largest

advertisements (due to the emergence of the Internet as a communication medium

Summary and conclusions

production, aspects of the product cycle highlights advertisers’ response to increasing

Limitations and future research

technological) with a potential effect on shaping firms’ green advertising strategies.

types of complexity”, International Marketing Review, Vol. 26 No. 3, pp. 327-47.

1988 Implementation across Europe of Environmental Policy initiatives

2005 EU GHG Emission Trading Scheme begins trading Climate change

About the authors

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