Good beginnings.
I've been following WalMart's sustainability plans for awhile now, and I have to admit I was initially impressed. One of the world's biggest companies actually making strides in sustainability and forcing its suppliers to come to heel? The ripples of the Sustainable Product Index, I was sure, would spread far.
That was until I read more about their plan. It's pretty simple really, and involves three steps:
1. Ask suppliers 15 simple questions about their supply chain and production practices.
2. Create a Sustainability consortium of universities, companies, NGOs and government to "develop a global database of information on the lifecycle of products...from raw materials to disposal."
Ok, so far so good. And finally:
3. To (and here I quote) "translate the information stored in the database into a simple tool that informs consumers about the sustainability of products."
Right. Because consumers are inherently dumb, and the complicated supply chain information needs to be "translated" before we get to have access to it.
While I'm sure that the information is complicated, and that most people buying Kraft mac 'n cheese, jelly donuts and frozen dinners don't give a flying crap about supply chains, leaving the end user out of the equation until the very end is a huge mistake. WalMart may have made strides on its way to taking over American industry, but it committed the cardinal sin of standards creation: only including the end user, you know, the actual people who will use the standard on a daily basis, at the end of the process.
It's not about the labeling, stupid.
I imagine WalMart's thinking has gone something like this:
"We have about a million moving parts to coordinate with the Index, so we'll tackle our suppliers first because they're more complicated. Then we'll make things seem more legitimate with a warm-and-fuzzy Consortium (I actually like this move, FYI). And finally, we'll slap some pretty labeling system on everything so Gina from Shattunket, Georgia can choose the toilet paper that speaks to her conscience just as well as it does her bottom."
But this is all backwards. Creating an index to be used by regular people isn't just about making it legible or usable (although that's definitely important and should be thought about up front anyway), it's about making it relevant.
And the only way to do that is to include the end user - you, me, everyone - right smack at the beginning the whole process. Word.