Defining natural

Disclosure: This post happens to be about one of our sponsors for BlogHer '09, but I had no intention of writing about them until I happened to read a conversation on BlogHer today.

Here is the conversation, on a basic promotional page for one of our sponsors, Clorox Green Works.

A couple of positive comment, and then a comment challenging the sponsor and their pointing out the lack of consistent definition for terms like "natural", etc.

So, social media step #1: Someone from the brand came to respond to the comment. Good job! Social media, don't forget, empowers not only we, the consumers, but companies too. The power to respond quickly and directly to your customers.

But what caught my eye, and prompted this unsolicited and unpromised post is this:

"When we created Green Works® natural cleaners, there was no standard or official definition for the term “natural” so we defined it using three core principles: the products had to contain plant-based ingredients and biodegradable cleaning ingredients, and could not be tested on animals. We believe we set the bar for natural cleaning very high, and stand by the natural profile and efficacy of our products.*"

* * To learn more about natural and what it means to us, click here. 

As I tweeted: Right on. Especially that last part. I'm not sure I've seen a lot of companies think of the animals when they're defining a "natural" product. Happy to see all three core principles.

Now, here's the question: Do other "natural" cleaners share the same core principles?

I'd try to compare to Method, but their site hasn't loaded over the last 20 minutes as I've been trying to get to their info. Sigh.

Perhaps an update post will be in order. But pipe up if you know!

Comments

[Maria Niles]

I'd guess that no-animal testing is a pretty common eco-friendly standard. But natural is an utterly and completely meaningless marketing term so I wouldn't put much stock in the connection.

For Method, they are super vegan friendly, you'll be happy to know. From their website:

All of method's current formulations are 100% vegan and therefore free of any animal ingredients and/or by-products.

method is 100% cruelty-free, has never tested its products nor their ingredients on animals and does not endorse, request nor commission any animal testing on our behalf.

method works with our suppliers to ensure that no animal testing ever be done in the development of ingredients for our products. Some suppliers of the more commonly used ingredients in cleaning and personal care products have been in production for over 50 years, and have performed animal testing in this time. method does not solicit, endorse, nor encourage animal testing from its suppliers; however, we bare no effect on testing done prior to our existence. Given that the vast majority of regulatory agencies in the world have historically preferred animal testing to gauge the safety of materials, the number of possible ingredients that have been animal tested at some point in their history is huge.

method has a forward-looking approach to making animal testing obsolete. We obtain statements from our suppliers that no testing is done on our behalf, and have lobbied to gain acceptance for our non-animal product testing protocols from various regulatory agencies, consumers, and others. For our product safety testing we use in-vitro (non-animal), simulated skin and eye irritation tests, and have been successful in arguing that various federal and state agencies should accept these test methods in the place of animal test results.

These efforts were part of the reason PETA named our two co-founders, Adam Lowry and Eric Ryan, people of the year for 2006 for their leadership in cruelty-free business practices and gave method a 'proggy' award that same year.

[Elisa Camahort Page]

Thanks Maria!

I should have known you would ride to my rescue. WIFI on a plane is awesome, but sometimes it seems to slow way down. Method just would not load.