April is here and the month of celebrating the planet begins! Many companies and brands will be focusing on their environmental impact more than ever this month – sharing their eco strategies as well as purchasing promotional products to help their employees and clients decrease their footprint in the world. While this is excited to see, companies must be careful to not fall prey to “greenwashing”, are marketing trap that can come across as phony and misleading.

Greenwashing is essentially when a company or organization spends more time and money on marketing themselves as being sustainable than on actually minimizing their environmental impact. It’s a deceitful advertising method to gain favor with consumers who choose to support businesses that care about bettering the planet. Greenwashing takes up valuable space in the fight against environmental issues, like climate change, plastic ocean pollution, air pollution and global species extinctions.

But, take heart, follow these ideas to avoid the pitfalls of greenwashing.

Ways to be Eco-friendly Without Greenwashing

1. Turn off the lights! This alone can cut energy costs greatly. Open curtains and use natural light, which will brighten rooms and moods. Add desk plants that thrive in sunlight and increase air quality and wellness.

2. Encourage reusable lunch items. Encourage employees to bring in their own meals will not only cut down on disposable packaging from takeout but it will help cut down on carbon emissions by not having people driving to get lunch every day.

3. Use a reusable coffee cup and water bottle. Instead of buying coffee in a paper cup every time you need a coffee fix, buy an insulated coffee mug and fill it up at the home or office with your daily coffee. Ban plastic water bottles and install high quality water coolers for refilling your gifted reusable water bottles.

4. Embrace reusable items. Talk to us about items that can reduce your waste output – refillable notebooks, whiteboards instead of post-it notes, even a pencil that lasts forever!

To avoid greenwash marketing for your brand, even unconsciously, continue to do your part by reaching for reusable products – not just in the month of April – but all year long.

For more inspiration on sustainable merchandise and trends, check out our latest catalogue here.