Ethical sunscreen: getting it covered?

The end of July. School is out, the beach is beckoning, and North America is just emerging from a massive heatwave. OK, so its grey and chilly in much of Northern Europe right now, but for many of us, summer is truly here. And like all self-respecting sunworshippers, we're all too aware that this means it is time for sunscreen. The question is, though, what is the responsible choice among the myriad brands in the market? And what counts for responsible when it comes to sunscreen anyway?

Over at the Ethical Consumer website, help is at hand. The UK-based magazine publishers and all-round ethical shopping wonks produce ethical buying guides for just about everything. Their buyers guide for sunscreen is available free and includes probably more information than anyone could possible want about how the various brands stack up against a wide array of social and environmental issues. Top of the list of things to avoid are potentially harmful chemical ingredients, including various parabens and cinnamates. Not to mention one of the more controversial ingredients around, nanoparticles. These are widely used in sunscreens, but have raised concerns around safety and environmental issues. Of course, the most responsible sunscreen is one that actually works. Natural, non-chemical ingredients are all well and good, but not if they don't guarantee you the protection you need ... or has been the case in the past, do not actually provide the SPF protection they claim on the package. With the EU tightening up regulation a few years ago, some of the "natural" producers have struggled to comply and stay in the market.

That said, unsurprisingly for an organization that has always held multinationals in low regard, the top-ranked brands according to Ethical Consumer are still largely small-scale natural product specialists, such as Yaoh organic hemp sunblock, and Green People sun lotion. Among the more well-known international brands, Clarins, Malibu, and Nivea are among the best scorers, though it has to be said that they all come in at less that 10 out of 20 on Ethical Consumer's scoring system. But this is mainly because the sunscreens are not just being ranked on their ingredients and other product-specific qualities. Ethical Consumer has always taken a more holistic view of a product's ethics, taking into account the producing company's policies and practices on a wide range of issues including employee rights, sustainability reporting, political involvement, and much more besides. In fact "product sustainability" is only one of five categories that a product is ranked on, the others being "environment", "animals", "people" and "politics". In essence, they evaluate the brand, not just the product.

Such a wide ranging assessment may not be for everyone. Some people just want to rate the product, not the whole corporate culture. In the past, you'd just have to stick with the final assessment given by the company doing the rating, but organizations like Ethical Consumer are now providing more sophisticated tools. We love the way they provide a customizable scorecard online so that you can quickly and easily prioritize the ethical issues that matter to you and de-prioritize those that don't just by using the sliding scales. And when you do, the differences between the sunscreen brands turn out to be more driven by company factors rather than simply product-specific factors. That's not to say these company factors aren't important. But clearly, not everyone is going to care as much about all the same issues. So customization is a technique that really works in ethical product ratings.

Where the sunscreen ratings don't quite convince though is on the real basics. People buy sunscreen to get protected from harmful UV rays. An ethical sunscreen has to be one that provides superior protection. But none of the more than 20 categories ranked by Ethical Consumer appear to include an assessment of actual performance. Maybe they just assume that if the products meet the legal standard then they are all of acceptable standard. But as far as we're concerned, ethical performance is not just about the ethical add-ons. It's also about doing the job the product is designed to do - and doing it well.  Marketers refer to this as the "core" and the "augmented" product. If ethical evaluations pay no heed to the core product benefits, then they miss out on half the picture. Its like lying in the sun and using sunscreen on everything except your most sensitive areas. Sure, you're taking precautions - but you're still gonna get burnt exactly where its going to hurt the most. Ethical rankings need to get the essentials covered.

Photo by Pedro Moura Pinheiro. Reproduced under Creative Commons licence  

After the Oscars...

We hope you enjoyed watching the Oscars yesterday. And depending on what country and station you saw them in, we hope you were not driven quite as crazy as we were by the subjection to endless commercial breaks every two minutes (What do all these ads about skin care products tell us about the viewers of the show, btw.?). Anyway, good to see that two of the films we talked about last week actually made it: Tilda Swinton for best supporting actress in ‘Michael Clayton’ and Daniel Day-Lewis for best actor in ‘There Will Be Blood’ (which got another one for something we forgot…).

Meanwhile, in a similar vein, the Corporate Responsibility Officer (CRO) organization in New York recently came up with their very own list of ‘Oscars’. It’s awarding the most responsible companies in the US, the ‘100 Best Corporate Citizens’. In its ninth year by now, the list ranks the biggest US companies according to a wide set of criteria, such as climate change, environment, human rights etc.

It’s is an interesting read in many ways. First of all, for who is on it. Intel Corp. is No 1 – fair enough, they do all these neat and clean electronic gadgets - fine. Or John Deere (No 4), they produce all these nice green tractors, so why not. Nike is third – not bad for a company which is meanwhile staple food in business ethics classes with their struggle on working conditions in their plants in Asia. But, gosh, look further down the list and there is Dow Chemical (13)! No mention of Dow’s haphazard approach to assume responsiblity for Bhopal victims after taking over Union Carbide (which was responsible for the disaster). And go to 39th position: lo and behold, Lockheed Martin (39)! Obviously producing weapons of mass destruction is a very socially responsible business proposition. Gas guzzler manufacturers are on there (Ford, General Motors), as are Monsanto and Coca Cola, again, usual suspects in most business ethics courses.

But don’t lest rush to conclusions. This is not just a ‘greenwash’ list. CRO also has a ‘Penalty Box’, where companies end up which for some ethical infractions were not included in the ranking: ExxonMobil for Oil Spills in their Brooklyn factories, Mattel for the scandals with Chinese suppliers or Hewlett-Packard for the handling of their board room leaks. That is interesting: as we understand CRO’s rationale – its not a problem if you are a sinner, as long as you repent and mend your ways! CRO, for instance, explains why they kept GAP on the list: despite the scandal around their suppliers’ working conditions in India last fall, the company reacted swiftly, transparent and consequently implemented their standards and values to fix the problem.

Whatever we may think of individual companies on the list, we like it for making obvious one important thing: the world of business ethics is no black and white film, where angels and devils are easily separated. Business reflects broader societal imperatives: at times, a majority of Americans approved of Bush’s Iraq adventure – hence there has to be someone to produce the weapons for this. SUVs are a huge market – so companies supplying them are just one villain – among others - in the game. And so on. To make it on the list then basically means that a companies attempts at going about their business with some basic concern for key ethical issues. That’s fair enough, certainly it’s a start.

In this sense the list is in fact selective: only three companies have been on the list for all nine years of its existence, namely Starbucks, Intel and Cisco. We have commented on the latter company with regard to their role in China, selling censorship technology to the Chinese government. And Starbuck’s is on the agenda of many activist and NGOs as well.

So what do we make of the ‘100 Best Corporate Citizens’ list? Our stance would be that CRO, as an organization of managers responsible for ethical issues in the corporate sector, has a specific angle on the subject. From this perspective, their list could probably be better dubbed as the ‘100 Lesser Evils’ – which lists companies with still a lot of work to do but who at least are conscious of their responsibility and are demonstrating some effort to live up to ethical and societal standards. And that’s a good thing – compared to some of the alternatives at least …