It's a small (green marketing) world after all

We are continuing to see an increase in consumer awareness of and demand for more things green. It's time that products marketing to conscious-consumers moved away from the expected "leafy green" approach and got a little more mainstream.

I just got back from the GoGreen Expo in NYC, and was pretty impressed by the number of booths and the variety of eco-oriented products. A lotta baby clothes and body lotions. Water filters and water bottles. Bags and antioxidants, etc. Hundreds of booths and new products.

But whether at the Expo or at the other events and sites I visit, I'm seeing a lot of unsophisticated design and underwhelming marketing in this space. I know how scary it can feel for a start up or small business to invest in good creative, but it doesn't have to be expensive. And there is everything to gain when trying to reach this now very eager audience.

Even the more established companies (relatively speaking) are using conspicuously similar styles... Check out these three companies -- and I happen to be a big fan of each of them -- but look at their logos!:

http://www.vivavi.com/ -- Leafy "V"
http://www.verterra.com/ - semi Leafy V
http://www.veevlife.com/ - double leafy V

Granted, my logo for Moss Appeal Green could be considered a close cousin of the leafy icon, but I come by my last name by birth! Plus it's a brand extension from my main Moss Appeal logo, which was designed to depict that our work has both "mass appeal" but speaks to the target on a 1:1 basis...AND echoes a type of moss plant, which you can see an image of on my home page. I'm not saying the logos for the above companies are not perfectly fine; I was just struck by the similarity of their looks...as well as the pervasive "beige colors and leaf pictures" at the whole expos.

There's one company doing it really well, and it's paying off: Green Apple Cleaners has a "clean" look, and impressive collateral to match. They're even savvy (and authentic) enough to be aligning themselves with the effort to make the Newton Pippin NY's "official apple." (But even they use a little plant cradled in two hands, with leaves that look like one of the logos above, as one of the images on their site.)

The time is now to start creating cool marketing that speaks to the mainstream more, because eco-sensitive products deserve to BE mainstream! We haven't had the opportunity for as big a change in consciousness as we're going through now in decades. Companies hoping to promote their "green appeal" as I like to call it, really owe it to themselves AND to us to get their good green word out there in the most stand-out way possible.

Call me.