Green-Hushing: Is It Better to Be Safe Than Sorry?

You have probably all heard of the term greenwashing— when companies falsely claim to be environmentally friendly—but have you heard of green hushing? Let’s look into it.

Almost in direct opposition of greenwashing, green hushing refers to the act of deliberately staying quiet about environmental efforts or sustainable practices. Instead of actively promoting sustainability achievements, some companies opt for deliberate discretion. An example of this could be a European clothing brand that produces their goods exclusively within Europe in order to reduce carbon emissions and improve supply chain transparency. Even though this sort of information could be considered crucial for potential customers to know, they choose not to publicly disclose it. The problem here isn’t that they aren’t acting in an eco-friendly way, it’s just that they’re not telling you about it (Font, Elgammal and Lamond, 2016). South Pole consultancy surveyed over 1200 companies and found that nearly 25% were actively avoiding discussing their science-based emissions targets, despite actively working towards them (Letzing, 2022). A real-world example of green hushing comes from Anheuser-Busch InBev, a US-American brewery company. Whilst they used to shamelessly promote their environmental goals, such as achieving net-zero emissions by 2040, suddenly, between 2022 and 2023, they stopped publicising these efforts altogether (Bawa, 2024). Hiding this information seems a bit paradoxical; you’d think that companies would want to brag about their sustainable efforts in order to attract new customers and appeal to environmentally conscious stakeholders. So why don’t they?

First, some companies might not realise how important it is to share their environmentally friendly journey. They might assume that until they’ve reached their goal, talking about a sustainable ‘work in progress’ isn’t worth it (Falchi, Grolleau and Mzoughi, 2022). Instead of offering continuous transparency to their consumers, they would prefer to only share the end results.

Alternatively, there might be companies driven by altruism. These are the businesses that genuinely want to do good, for the sake of doing good, not for external rewards or profit. They fear that if they publicise their efforts, it could undermine their intrinsic motivations. From their perspective, doing is more important than showing (Falchi, Grolleau, and Mzoughi, 2022).

But, let’s be honest- the most common reason that brands keep quiet is due to the risk of backlash. Companies fear that publicising their sustainability initiatives will lead to them being accused of hypocrisy, otherwise known as Greenwashing. Being associated of greenwashing can severely damage a company’s reputation, cause financial loss, and even trigger legal consequences (Carlos and Lewis, 2017). For example Eni, an Italian energy company, had to pay a $5.6 million fine after falsely advertising its biofuel as environmentally friendly (Davison, 2024). It is for this reason that many organisations would rather stay quiet than follow in Eni’s footsteps, even if in their sustainability efforts are genuine and truthful.

But if a company is genuinely trying to be environmentally friendly, what’s the harm in keeping quiet about it? I’ll tell you:

The lack of transparency can threaten a company’s relationship with its customers. People want to support brands that align with their values, which for some might be eco-friendly practices. When companies then don’t communicate about their green efforts, they miss out on the opportunity to build relationships with customers who are sctively seeking sustainability in the brands they support (Ettinger et al., 2020). Additionally, green hushing can damage the broader market for green products. If sustainable companies stay silent, it becomes harder for consumers to differentiate between genuinely eco-friendly businesses, and those that are simply engaging in greenwashing. The lack of transparency can foster mistrust, thereby making it harder for businesses with strong sustainability records to stand out and attract eco-conscious consumers (Ayoade, 2023).

Whilst greenhushing might seem like a safe way to avoid scrutiny, it risks undermining the public’s trust, hindering the progress that could be made if businesses were more open about their sustainable journeys. Being transparent about sustainable efforts not only benefits the company itself, but the entire green economy as well, fostering a healthy competition and innovation towards a more sustainable future.

Olga Schweitzer

Bibliography:

Ayoade, A. (2023) What is Greenhushing and Is It Worse Than Greenwashing? https://www.wearefuterra.com/blog/what-is-greenhushing-and-is-it-worse-than-greenwashing.

Bawa, P. (2024) Guest Post – When Companies Go Quiet: Exploring the rise of Greenhushing. https://www.esgtoday.com/guest-post-when-companies-go-quiet-exploring-the-rise-of-greenhushing/.

Carlos, W.C. and Lewis, B.W. (2017) 'Strategic silence: withholding certification status as a hypocrisy avoidance tactic,' Administrative Science Quarterly, 63(1), pp. 130–169. https://doi.org/10.1177/0001839217695089.

Davison, T. (2024) 'Greenwashing Examples : The 9 Biggest Fines Given to Companies,' CleanHub, 12 August. https://blog.cleanhub.com/greenwashing-examples.

Ettinger, A. et al. (2020) 'The Desirability of CSR Communication versus Greenhushing in the Hospitality Industry: The Customers’ Perspective,' Journal of Travel Research, 60(3), pp. 618–638. https://doi.org/10.1177/0047287520930087.

Falchi, A., Grolleau, G. and Mzoughi, N. (2022) 'Why companies might under‐communicate their efforts for sustainable development and what can be done?,' Business Strategy and the Environment, 31(5), pp. 1938–1946. https://doi.org/10.1002/bse.2991.

Font, X., Elgammal, I. and Lamond, I. (2016) 'Greenhushing: the deliberate under communicating of sustainability practices by tourism businesses,' Journal of Sustainable Tourism, 25(7), pp. 1007–1023. https://doi.org/10.1080/09669582.2016.1158829.

Letzing, J. (2022) What is ‘greenhushing’ and is it really a cause for concern? https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2022/11/what-is-greenhushing-and-is-it-really-a-cause-for-concern/.