Day 2 of Opportunity Green kicked off with Joe Laur, VP of Content for Greenopolis and co-author of the Necessary Revolution. His presentation focused on systems thinking. In his view, environmental issues are not caused so much by bad people, but flawed systems. We frame our world view by the stories and myths we tell ourselves. He showed a simple crudely drawn line drawing that looked like an adult with child standing below a window near the corner of a room. In most industrialized countries, that’s what people see in that drawing. But in agrarian cultures, they see an adult and child carrying a package on their head to market and have stopped to take shelter under a tree in the middle of a hot day. The drawing isn’t different, our perception is, and it’s based on our world view. So how do we change the stories? We have to change our systems.
Joe was followed by Beth Springer of Clorox. Unfortunately, she presented a disappointing show that felt like a company pitch. Rather than showing products and sustainable initiatives as a way to inspire the audience, it was a defense of product and process. A very strange approach. Something on one of her slides caught my eye. She was talking about how Clorox has been measuring their total environmental impact. With one chart, she showed how the company identified fifteen percent of that impact as consumer based - meaning impact occuring after the product is purchased and used by the consumer. This wasn’t the first time I’ve seen a company do this, but it was the first time it struck me as odd. On day 1 of Opportunity Green, someone from P&G showed a similar graph. And earlier this year I heard someone from Levi & Strauss talk about how half the total impact of blue jeans is customer cleaning. Doesn’t it seem odd that adding consumer impact to the total reduces their part of the equation? In my opinion, unless some part of your corporate sustainability strategy is specifically targeted to the consumer side and helping them make change, those numbers should be removed from the chart. When Levi & Strauss presented this info, their solution was to suggest consumers wash their clothes less frequently. Seriously? Yes, their plan to effect half of the total impact was to suggest doing less of a required activity. I’m someone who sweats enough that I have to wash my clothes often or they stink. So would it help reduce the Levi & Strauss environmental impact if I sweat less? It seems like an attempt by large corporations to spin the their impact and divert attention away from them to consumers.
Before lunch, event organizers presented thirteen start-up ideas which they edited down from more than five hundred applications. Each was allowed one minute to deliver their best pitch. Then a company called mobilcause set up a live poll. The audience was given a code for each start-up and asked to vote using twitter. Live on the main stage screen a bar chart came to life showing live voting results. It was great. In the end, a new company who manufactures a packing cushion alternative to expanded polystyrene that’s made of processed soil won the competition. In a proprietary process, they are converting compost material and soil into packing filler. It’s a killer idea that will soon go to market. Very cool.
The conference closed with a session on social media that turned into a Q&A on the marketing value of Twitter. As I’ve seen many times before, a panelist told the audience that social media is all about engaging customers in a conversation. And that’s true, but I’ve yet to attend a session about the topic that actually gives useful info about how to find the most valuable audience. Since this was a conference about sustainability, why didn’t the panel talk about where that audience lives? Instead, the discussion revolved around general Twitter issues and did little more than scratch the surface. I was hoping for something a bit deeper to close out two pretty good days.
When I attended Opportunity Green last year, it cost $675. The size and configuration meant it was a good venue for personal contact with like minded people for potential business contact development. And the speaker list was very impressive. The price was a little steep compared to other events I attended that year, but seemed like a good value. This year, however, the price was thirty percent higher. The speaker list was comparable, but the increased price wasn't justified by event quality or content. It wasn't quite the same value. Next year will be a tough decision.
Written by Kevin O’Donnell, fundamentalist at thread collaborative. To read more, please visit our web site.
Meena Kapur
said on November 09, 2009
thread collaborative
said on November 13, 2009
Thanks for the comment. No, I did not see added value. In fact, there may have been less value. I thought the speaker line up was better last year. I think it's a good event, but questionable value. I can't tell you how many people are telling me they didn't go because of price. I'm in Phoenix right now attending Greenbuild. My business partner and I combined cost less than Opp Green, yet it's a much bigger event. It's a fine line the organizers straddle.