Is The Next Bubble “Green?”
By Designitgreener Editor
The nineties were all about the Internet. It seemed that by simply adding a dot.com extension to the tail end of your business name, investors would give you backing, customers would flock to you in droves and your stock price would increase exponentially. Without a website you were a nobody––a business on borrowed time––and your time was running out at the speed of cyberspace. That was perception, until of course the reality set in.
Can the same be said for the enthusiasm surrounding the “green” movement? In the last few years being green has gone from the CO-OP to the Corporation with players like Proctor & Gamble and Wal-Mart realizing that there is more than one “green” in this new consumer, media and now government driven movement.
The media has been hyping “green” for several years and politicians are now promoting “green jobs” as the savior of the faltering economy. But is this realistic? The dot.com analogy is probably a good one. While the dot.com movement in the nineties did bubble and bust to an extent, online commerce certainly didn’t go away as it is now at record levels. It has changed the way we shop, view media and even entertain ourselves. What the dot.com bust did was to eliminate the posers. Those who jumped on the technology bandwagon and in many cases were propped up by investment capital, but didn’t have a viable product or service that anyone wanted or needed.
The green movement will likely see a similar bubble/bust scenario with viable products and services surviving and changing how we shop and the contents of what we buy. The busters will be those that are over-hyped or over-subsidized beyond their true demand. Governments can play a huge roll in how high the bubbles go and how extensive the inevitable bust will be depending on the extent they artificially subsidize incentives to drive “green” beyond consumer demand. This has the potential to amplify the bubble effect of the green movement as investment capital did during the dot.com boom.
There is no doubt a greener reality will be with us for a long time. We will be living greener, using less energy per household and buying greener products and services in the future. The question is how big a bubble (and bust) will likely be created getting there? Like in the dot.com boom, it will depend on how many posers there are – and how much they will be artificially subsidized beyond the markets demand for them.
What do you think?
My concern at this point is how much the recession is affecting the green revolution. It seems like, so far, we’re experiencing a culture that is having to invest in sustainable solutions when it’s flush, but when we’re broke, people just want cheap deals, no one wants to pay extra for green. So the eco-friendly businesses that survive vs. those who don’t may not be defined by who the posers are, but by who manages to be both eco-friendly AND eco-nomical.
Unlike the dot.com boom, the sustainability movement is about the shift in our mindset. However you came to the movement — consciously or by accident — once you are aware of the consequences of your choices, it’s hard to turn back.
The hype will subside as “green” becomes the norm, but there are fundamental shifts occurring in major industries — building, financial, energy, automotive — towards more sustainable, “greener” practices. The best companies are choosing the triple bottom line economic model over the single bottom line one. And some of the industries that are leading the green revolution, such as green building, have already demonstrated that it’s not a fad – the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) celebrated its 15th anniversary in 2008.