Thinking green

Folio: The Magazine for Magazine Management, Feb 1, 1991 by Cary Peyton Rich

This article is printed on 50 lb. Pentair Recycle Gloss, a recycled paper supplied courtesy of Niagara of Wisconsin.

In the 1957 movie Funny Face, a fashion magazine editor examines the layout for an upcoming issue and decides it's all wrong. With dramatic flair, red pencil flying, she alters the entire thing at the last minute. (Some things never change!) Then-since it is a musical-she breaks into, "Think Pink!" By the time the song is finished, every woman in the country is wearing pink; every home is furnished with pink (and that includes the kitchen sin and, finally, there's even talk of a pink transcontinental train.

It's doubtful any one magazine exerts that much influence over the America of today. Collectively, however, magazines do have the power to change attitudes and enforce trends. And because of that, it's time for the industry to sing a new tune: "Think green!"

As we enter the second year of the nineties, concern for the environment has emerged as the hot topic of the decade.

It's a fitting subject for the end of an extremely wasteful century. Yet one of the most remarkable things about the Green Rush is that, for the most part, the movement has been consumer-driven. Which is not to say that magazines haven't jumped on the green bandwagon: Dozens of magazines came out with special Earth Day issues last year. Many have established ongoing sections covering the environment and related issues. Others have developed programs within their own corporate environs.

However, if today's concern for the environment is not to go the way of hula-hoops and smiley faces, the media must continue its coverage. Consumers, as we all know, are fickle. Magazines (and newspapers and television) have to keep fanning the public's interest without blowing out the flame.

Besides, the simple fact remains that business and industry cannot continue to operate in a wasteful, irresponsible way. Too often, the corporate way of life has been to consider the bottom line and to hell with everything else. Now, businesses are finding they must be ready to answer their critics. It's easy to say, "We've always done it this way," but that's no longer sufficient.

It is time for the magazine industry to embrace the motives and methods of an environmentally responsible industry. There are choices to be made, tradeoffs to consider. "Economics is going to play a big part in a company's decision to be environmentally conscious," warns Mike Mangan, an Okauchee, Wisconsin-based environmental consultant. "If there's no economic incentive, environmental issues could be put on the back burner. Companies want the cheapest, not only the cleanest."

It helps that the environment is popular with everyone. No company is going to say, "I'm against. the earth." Remembering that is an important weapon in the face of reticence. Newsweek surveyed its subscribers and found that four out of five are influenced by, a manufacturer's record on the environment when purchasing a product. And 94 percent of Newsweek's nearly three million readers consider themselves environmentalists.

What follows is an overview of some of the environmental problems plaguing the magazine industry, followed by a look at what some individual magazines and corporations are doing to battle those problems. Finally, there are some suggestions for those wondering how to be ecologically correct in their own company.

I. PROBLEMS.

The kraft wrap versus polybag versus UV coating debate.

It's a hard debate to win. Polybags had been hailed as a way to protect magazines from rough handling by the Postal Service and to carry outserts. Then came the accusations: Polybags don't decompose; they'll be in landfills forever.

The next craze centered on biodegradable polybags. Plastics companies claimed that mixing the plastic with cornstarch would cause the resulting film to break down in landfills. Some would react to the sun; others would decompose in the soil. Then came the bad news. Those bags didn't really degrade, but left plastic dust particles that would never break down.

So some environmentally conscious publications switched to old-fashioned kraft wrap, Paper, everyone knew, was much better for the environment. Or was it? Environmentalists argue that the paper takes up to 50 years to decompose in landfills. And, by volume, it uses more landfill space than the dreaded polybags.

The New Yorker resolved the dilemma by using recycled kraft wrap. Audubon picked an unusual solution. Instead of turning to kraft wrap, the environmental magazine went with UV coating on its cover, even though the UV coating prohibits breakdown of the cover and renders the stock unsuitable for de-inking- and therefore recycling.

"It's hard to be a purist," notes one environmentalist. "You have to balance things, as much as you'd like to be pure." Distribution practices Doug Moss, editor and publisher of E magazine, says the entire magazine industry is very wasteful. But one of the worst areas is a result of current newsstand distribution practices. "The whole distribution system is really wasteful," he exclaims. "Magazines are a little overambitious in what they print for the newsstands. They say, Let's send more if we're getting back 50 percent. We can afford to operate at 2 5 percent.' They pick efficiencies based on economics. We should send fewer copies if we're not selling them."