Crystal Wong's blog

In BrandChannel’s blogpost  World Water Day Highlights Japan’s Ongoing Challenge, it speaks about marketers rising up to bring attention to issues related to the current world issues. I find it pretty cool that in times of world crises/global issues, many different marketers that are usually competitors with one another, can all work towards the same goal, all in their own unique ways. For example, BrandChannel brings attention to Levi’s® “Watertank” app on Facebook, where people around the world can play online games and overcome water-saving challenges and “unlock” water, raising awareness about the importance of water and learn ways that we can save water and basically help to support water.org‘s clean water projects .  What a fun way to learn about it! Also, they have something called Water<Less jeans, which are jeans made by using less water in the manufacturing process. The WaterTank app was released after the recent earthquake and tsunami in Japan. (If you’d like to learn more about the app and/or Levi’s water sustainability efforts, click here!)

I think it’s really important for powerful brands to use their influence to bring awareness to issues such as this. Some other examples include: Asia Pacific Nalco and Asia Pulp & Paper Group has pledged to reduce their water footprint and will work together to help Indonesian countries have cleaner water, and Teva, a shoe company, has started a new campaign called “A Pair for A Foot”, where for every pair of shoes they sell, they will protect one linear foot of global waterways.

While some people may say that this is simply a marketing gimmick to gain customers, I think otherwise. Yes, they could simply donate money to these organizations, and I think they would either way. Just that by including consumers, those who aren’t able to make a difference by themselves can feel like they’re helping out, even if it’s in just a small way, like buying a pair of shoes!

I just found out that Matt&Nat (the brand I talked about in one of my first posts) is also a supporter of this water movement. Check it out: 

So on an ending note… reduce water usage! We really do take it for granted.