企业低调环保的苦衷

   罗布•萨缪尔斯是酿者之徽公司（Maker’s Mark）的首席运营官，同时也是创始人老比尔•萨缪尔斯的孙子。他在肯塔基的家就在公司酿酒厂所在的自然保护区附近。家里有一个吧台，吧台后面放着酿者之徽酿造的第一瓶酒，已经有54年的历史了。

    “假如我们今晚就把这瓶酒打开，它的味道会和我们现在生产的酒完全一样，”萨缪尔斯说。

    酿者之徽可能是世界上最环保和最具社会责任的酒业公司，但是萨缪尔斯认为，公司所采取的许多举措只是在商言商。大多数消费者只需要知道，每次剥去红色封蜡所得到的酒物有所值就好。

    谈及公司对环保的重视，萨缪尔斯说：“它是酿者之徽基因的一部分。”他说：“我祖父是个什么样的人在某种程度上就决定了我们与消费者之间的联系方式。他非常谦逊。我们并不想跳出来大吹大擂，告诉大家我们有多环保。”

    消费者的环保意识日益强烈，很多企业都希望利用这一点赚一笔，因此无数的产品都开始将“绿色”标志作为自己营销活动的一部分。甚至连瓶装水和乙烯基壁板这样的因破坏环境而臭名昭著的产品，现在都开始吹嘘自己拥有绿色证书。

    但是，许多真正在环保领域推陈出新的企业却并不愿意赤裸裸地用绿色和环保吸引消费者的眼球。或许是担心人们会觉得冠冕堂皇，或许是认为消费者对企业的社会责任缺乏了解的兴趣，又或许是因为一大批竞争对手都自称肩负着同样的使命，但结果却不尽相同，总之，许多成功企业在宣称自己的环保贡献之前，都会三思而后行。

    “重要的是消费者和产品之间的匹配性，”芝加哥大学布斯商学院（Booth School of Business）的营销学教授桑杰•达尔称。“必须评估消费者的需求和动机，以及将绿色环保特性与产品结合的重要性。”

    达尔表示，某些产品的碳足迹可能会让消费者兴味索然，而另一些产品的绿色证书或许会让人联想到质量低劣。

    20世纪后期的环保产品往往很昂贵，而且外观丑陋，质量低劣（想想第一代混合动力汽车就知道了）。达尔称，老一辈的一些人仍然抱有这种成见，但随着新一代进入消费经济，这种观念已经过时。

    “年轻一代的绿色环保观念非常明确，”他说。“他们成长于一个更具社会责任的世界。”

    酿者之徽的策略是，只向参观其位于自然保护区的肯塔基州总部的消费者宣传其酒的质量并详细介绍生产过程。

    在这里，已有10多万参观者了解了酿者之徽公司坚持使用当地的原材料生产以及回收副产品为其工厂供电的做法。参观者还能了解现场污水处理厂的运作。处理厂在旱季，会将清水排放到附近的溪流中，而酿者之徽的长远目标是做到碳平衡（通过计算二氧化碳的排放总量，然后用植树等方式把这些排放量吸收掉，以达到环保的目的——译注）。

    At the Kentucky home of Rob Samuels, the chief operating officer of Maker's Mark bourbon and grandson of founder Bill Samuels Sr., not far from the nature preserve on which the distillery sits, the 54-year-old first bottle the company ever made sits behind the bar.

    "If we were to open that bottle tonight, it would taste exactly like what we produce today," he says.

    Maker's is possibly the most environmentally friendly and socially responsible alcohol company in the world, but Samuels believes that the many initiatives the company has taken are just part of doing business. What most customers need to know is only that every time they peel off that red wax seal, they'll get what they are paying for.

    "It's part of the DNA of Maker's Mark," Samuels says of the company's devotion to the environment. "The way we connect with consumers is in part about who my grandfather was. He was very modest. It's not about standing on top of a mountain and screaming the loudest that this is happening."

    The "green" label has wormed its way into the marketing campaigns of countless products as businesses try to capitalize on the growing environmental consciousness of consumers. Even environmentally damaging products with notorious reputations like bottled water and vinyl siding now boast their green credentials.

    But many of the most genuine corporate innovators in the environmental space prefer not to throw it in their customers' faces. Whether it's coming from a fear of sounding disingenuous, a perceived lack of customer interest in corporate social responsibility, or a slew of competitors claiming the same mission without the same results, many successful businesses are thinking twice before screaming green.

    "What's important is looking at the fit between customers and products," says Sanjay Dhar, a marketing professor at University of Chicago's Booth School of Business. "You must assess the needs and motivations of your customers and the importance of integrating the message of green with … the product."

    While one product's carbon footprint may inspire a complete lack of interest among consumers, another product's green credentials may trigger associations with inferior quality, he says.

    Environmentally friendly products of the late 20th century were often expensive, ugly, and inferior (think first-generation hybrid cars). Some in older generations still cling to that idea, but it has faded as a new generation enters the consumption economy, Dhar says.

    "The younger generation has a clean slate in their mind when it comes to green," he says. "They are growing up in a much more socially responsible world."

    Maker's strategy is to advertise the quality of its alcohol and introduce the details of its manufacturing process only to customers who visit its Kentucky headquarters, which is a nature preserve.

    There, more than 100,000 visitors have learned about how the company uses locally sourced ingredients and recycles the byproducts to power its plant. They can also learn about the on-site wastewater treatment plant that pumps fresh water into nearby creaks during the dry season and the company's long-term goal of becoming carbon neutral.