This is the latest of a series of tips extracted from the Green Business Bible e-book:
Avoid the following while making green claims:
- Lying: don’t be tempted.
- Manipulating life cycle data: WYGIWYN - the What You Get Is What You Need syndrome.
- Selective reporting: OK, so your new product may be made from 100% recycled material, but if it is also highly toxic, it would be a bit naughty to suggest it is ‘green’.
- Irrelevance: stating CFC-free on a product which is never likely to contain CFCs.
- Overstating the case: Shell recently got in trouble with the Advertising Standards Agency for implying that all of their CO2 emissions were used to grow flowers when only 0.325% were used in this way.
- Being vague: simply saying you are green is not good enough. Prove it!


Good list. Unfortunately, it is getting harder to evaluate such claims because of the complex web of relations between parameters.