Corporate social responsibility—the trendy tide of good works ranging from helping the poor to saving the planet—often marries strange bedfellows. The clothing giant Gap is now involved in the fight against HIV, Wal-Mart sells tons of disposable plastics but is trying to go green, and Coca-Cola is collaborating with the World Wildlife Federation. While it all seems like a fashionable step in the right direction, sometimes it can be hard to tell whether companies do good works because they really care about a social or environmental problem or because they want to seem like they do.
The cynic in me looks to the latter. Making consumers think your brand is somehow doing good, even when your company really isn’t, is akin to putting lipstick on a pig: you can dress her up, but at the end of the day she’s still rolling in the muck. Many companies have tried to look pretty for the public, while remaining quite ugly underneath. After the Exxon Valdez oil spill, the crude giant started pouring money into environmental programs, but it’s clear that it was its reputation Exxon was really trying to save. The tobacco industry sponsors youth anti-smoking campaigns while simultaneously trying to get them to take up the habit. And big pharma may be providing antiretroviral drugs at low cost now, but only after immense pressure from the public and international community. When you consider the amount companies spend on touting these “responsible projects”—with glossy handbooks, commercials, and press releases by the PR team—it goes to show it is sometimes just about the show.
It may be easy to see past this egregious type of corporate hypocrisy, but what about the portion-of-proceeds type giving? In the retail sector, many companies donate a portion of their sales from particular items to a good cause. This seems like a win-win situation: it helps the consumer feel good about their purchase, and provides sustainable funds for a social or environmental cause that would otherwise not have them. But the real motive behind such programs is obscure. Perhaps they are ultimately just a great way to sell more stuff, without helping, and perhaps contributing to, the underlying cause of said problem.
For instance, I recently received news of H&M’s new “Fashion Against AIDS” clothing line. Twenty-five percent of the proceeds from this line will go to YouthAIDS, Population Services International’s HIV/AIDS prevention initiative. The H&M t-shirts, designed by artists, musicians, and fashion leaders, have messages like “stop and think” and “wear a condom.” All garments from the H&M line carry a special tag that reads: “This might be the most important piece of clothing you’ve ever had your hands on.”
