Asda’s George says ‘be green, wash at 30’
News just in from Asda, in a gambit that has to be one of the cheekiest bits of green spin, ever: from March this year, its George clothes will recommend you wash them at 30 degrees Celsius.
As Asda points out, if all the 237 million garments George sells every year were washed at 30 degrees celsius, £200,000 would be saved in electricity and - according to the Energy Saving Trust - 'enough CO2 to fill 4,600 double decker buses' in carbon.
The 'wash cooler' advice reminds me of Ariel's Wash-at-30 degrees campaign last September. Like Asda, it flagged up the eneryg-saving merits of turning the dial on your machine, suggesting 1.6 billion kilowatt-hours of energy are being wasted annually by washing at the traditional 40 degrees.
George and Asda's move will, of course, cost them nothing, since the only change will be to the recommended temperature label on their clothes - it'll appear on George's entire range in March.
Most ethical shoppers at this point will still have their doubts over George's ethical credentials as it's hard to see fair wages being paid to workers when a George women's tee costs £3, the same as a bottle of Asda rose wine. The Asda press office assured Newconsumer.com that the company has a 'dedicated sourcing team ensuring everything is ethically sourced.'
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Comments
Read the comments from other new comsumers and login or register to post your own thoughts...
New Leaf says
I’d like to see solid proof of how the ASDA source their ethically produced own brands.
And it’s a pity that neither Asda nor Ariel produce or promote eco washing powder that doesn’t pollute the environment! It’s all very well harping on about saving energy when they are doing very little to cut down chemicals in many households washing machines.
Adam Vaughan says
On the proof front… me too!
And, yes, it’d be cool if they promoted Ecover or the other alternatives at the same time. I use Ecover at home on 30 and it works fine; I don’t smell, honest.
The Green Bird says
The thing that gets me is that they can promote a £20 suit and tag on that they are part of the Ethical Trading Initiative. Does this justify ASDA being able to produce cheap clothing or completely undermine the ETI?
maskedmannequin says
So many companies seem to paying the whole ethical production or ethical trading idea lip service...like new look/top shop/asda/tesco having small selections of organically produced cotton garments…
It’s kind of difficult to see which companies are GENUINELY trying to change and which are making an effort to fool the consumers.... sad really. I guess at least the media coverage of ethical issues is having SOME effect...but not sure exactly how many of these companies are doing it to appear ethical and how many are really trying to change…