It really was a matter of time before the FTC starting cracking down. I figured it was around the corner. What is important to know is that the FTC publishes Green Guides to help marketers avoid making false or misleading green claims by explaining how consumers understand commonly used terms, such as “biodegradable” and “recyclable,” and by describing the basic elements needed to substantiate those claims.

If you read some of my previous blog posts, I indicated that I thought we were getting closer to fining companies for false green claims as they do in Europe.

Kmart and Tender have agreed to settle the cases against them; the case against Dyna-E will be litigated. The testimony states that with the recent growth in “green” advertising and product lines, the agency will continue its efforts to ensure that environmental marketing is truthful, substantiated, and not confusing to consumers.

This basically means, get your facts straight and make sure you are truly green before you put it out there for the world to see.

Here is the story on the above retailers and why they were charged:

The conference was well-attended, in fact, they ended up with so many late registrations that they ran out of food! I guess it is a good problem to have. Although there numbers were down, they still ended up with close to 2000 attendees from all industries and an exhibit floor packed with corporate vendors. This is another conference that had me wondering if we were really in the midst of a recession. There was an event at every corner — Luncheons, breakfasts, dinners and receptions. From Wine Country receptions to senior executive receptions, food, drinks and deserts were aplenty.

When I was checking out, I spoke with the front desk person at the Hilton San Fran who indicated he had a hard time believing it was a recession as their hotel had been sold out for 3 weeks straight — 2000 rooms.

I spoke on creating authentic green value and received some great questions from the audience members on how to create it and how to get around costs when selling higher priced green projects.

In the past month, since we’ve rolled out some new green marketing assessment tools, I’ve been asked what makes companies and corporations successful in marketing green products, services or green initiatives.

The reason my company originally developed green marketing assessment tools was to help organizations, corporations and companies determine if their roll outs would be successful in the green arena. I realized quickly that everyone needed more education and then rolled out my Creating Authentic Green Value Webinar series, http://www.marketing-insider.com/secrets_of_green_brands_webinar/

There is so much to learn in this ever changing green and sustainability marketplace. One thing is for sure, though, certain rules still apply.

• Education is paramount to make customers aware of what you mean when you indicate a product, service or brand is green/sustainable. The more education, the better in my opinion.

• Knowing your customer and that not all green consumers and business think and act the same

• Knowing how to effectively position your message, when to say what, what to say in general

• Determining where you can position your company in the over-crowded green marketplace to allow it to rise above the clutter and not be one of the “me too” generations

• Knowing what else you need to work on internally to be successful in launching a green campaign and how your message should follow your greening process

• Knowing what the trends are in the marketplace, which are here to stay

What doesn’t work:

What I wanted to discuss in this blog post is how you handle any type of bad publicity as it relates to your company, especially if you are positioning your brand and company as sustainable and socially responsible.

Being a sustainable company carries with it a degree of responsibility to treat people fairly, be kind to the environment, and be completely responsible as a company and corporation. Responsibility comes in the form of being transparent so that people know you are not trying to make yourself look perfect, but your brand more human—showing your flaws and all. It is easier and more forgivable for issues to come from you versus the media and it puts in less of reactionary position.

You can read more about this particular case that was covered in-depth in the Ethical Corporation magazine. They’ll be talking about the alleged evidence that will be presented in Manhattan federal court, of the contact Shell had with the military government of Nigeria’s Sani Abacha before he ordered the execution of nine activists, including Saro-Wiwa, in 1995.

This is not a great position for Shell or any company to be in for that matter.

So how would you handle it? How would you handle publicity of any human rights violation?

In Eastern Australian communities, where the toll of a six-year-long drought has been devastating, interviews with farmers provided additional momentum for the solastalgia concept.

In one such interview, a female farmer poignantly described the loss of her garden oasis. “Our gardens have had to die,” she said, “because our house dam has been dry…. So it’s very depressing for a woman because a garden is an oasis out here with this dust…you know, to come home to a nice green lawn is just… that’s all gone, so you’ve got dust at your back door, ” according to this same article.

When they conducted interviews in drought-affected communities in New South Wales in 2005, the responses suggested some of their subjects may have been suffering from a psychological condition called solastalgia (pronounced so-la-stal-juh).

I learned of a new doctors office that was more holistically-minded and green. They were marketing these two positioning lines on their website. It was quite attractive to many consumers in a state that did not have many holistically-minded doctors and really no green medical offices such as this. When I checked out the practice, I noticed that although they had a handful of green features, there were many other things they did not embrace. They mentioned being holistic and having green furniture and carpeting, plus no VOC paint, yet when you went into the bathroom, the soap, sprays, etc. were all chemicals. There was definitely a disconnect of what being green really meant. They went so far as to invest in some green furniture and carpeting, etc., yet the simple things such as soap and cleaners were forgotten and not understood, yet they professed being totally green.

This particular business had the best intentions just as anyone else does, they just didn’t understand the concept of what green meant. They didn’t understand that eliminating chemicals was a huge component of the equation.

Could they be greenwashed?

These green neighborhood near downtown Greenville, called the Elements, is for multi-families something you do not see as often as single-family, green communities. Here are some of the features of these new homes:

• All the trim on the walls comes from trees that were cut down on site.

• Increased insulation resulting in a savings between 30 and 50 percent to code built homes

This owner really understood that green positioning could be used to her advantage not just from a marketing and selling standpoint, but also as a way to operate. Her company was built on more of a virtual platform as her 20 sales reps were spread out throughout the nation and worked from their homes. Once she realized more about sustainability as a platform for her business, she realized that her mindset and own beliefs really fit in well. She was already operating with a philosophy of good intentions by generously paying her people and going above and beyond for her customers. It was no wonder her business in 3 years time was on a fast track.

I really thought this was an ingenious way to allow corporations to see the benefit of using these personal mats over the large mats they need to use in their factories.

It makes sense as this is a way for consumers to save dollars and do something for the environment, especially if their garden is grown without pesticides.

Many companies are prospering because of this. Companies such as Scotts who makes gardening products and seed companies are able to capitalize and so are others. Anyone who makes a product that would contribute to building a produce garden and a green one would prosper in the economy.

Who else would?

How it would work would be that smart meters would be installed on people’s homes in place of the older models. This would relay information about electricity use and price to consumers and let utilities collect usage data wirelessly without trucks or meter readers. The debate is whether or not real-time pricing will work. Will consumers be willing to pay more as others blast their air conditioning with the idea that demand would be low on a cool night and prices would be lower? Pricing could literally change per minute. Are we ready for this change?

The idea is that overall energy costs would come down even if only 20% of customers take part in the pricing and efficiency program, under PepsiCo Holdings Inc’s plan. Will it work?

There is much debate, yet my question is how will you get consumers to buy-in?

Not being satisfied with the number of registrations that were coming in on their own, they were proactive and called everyone personally to invite them to the conference. And I have to tell you this was one of the best conferences I ever attended. What I saw and heard was refreshing.