Walker On Fiji

In his latest Consumed article, Rob Walker looks at the eco-attack on the water brand Fiji and their reaction to it – which includes an advertising campaign that promotes its green credentials. Walker raises an interesting point at the end of the piece about consumption decisions and our need for brands to help us make them.

If you’ve come across any of the many media accounts of a consumer uprising against bottled water, you might well assume that makers and sellers of the stuff are on their knees. You might further assume that Fiji Water, which comes from an aquifer in the South Pacific, would be in particularly bad shape: it is a regular target of scorn in those accounts, cited to underscore eco-conscious consumers’ discomfort (or disgust) with something shipped halfway around the planet that also happens to come out of your kitchen tap. Maybe this would explain the brand’s decision to convert pretty much its entire marketing message to: We are an eco-friendly “green” company.

…it’s probably wrongheaded to see Fiji’s greened-up image as being aimed at eco-opponents. It really speaks to consumers who are conflicted. Not so long ago we all felt good about drinking less soda; do we now have to feel guilty unless we drink tap water? Reid Lifset, the editor of Yale’s Journal of Industrial Ecology… empathizes with the consumer. “People don’t want to spend their lives wrapped up in ambiguities over one consumption decision,” he says. We want to be told whether something is terrible or perfectly acceptable. Fiji is offering its answer — an answer that, so far, people are still buying.

Consumed – Water Proof – Fiji Water – Consumed – Rob Walker – NYTimes.com