Kermit the Frog famously lamented, “It’s not easy being green,” and the dearth of eco-friendly content on TV seems to bear him out. For the fourth straight year, NBCUniversal will try to reverse this, marking Earth Week yet again with 100 hours of green-themed programming splashed across its brand portfolio.
The centerpiece of NBCU’s April 18-24 “Green Is Universal” initiative integrates story lines about recycling and power conservation into the narratives of series such as Oxygen’s Tori & Dean: sTORIbook Weddings and G4’s Attack of the Show.
News outlets MSNBC and CNBC will also participate in the weeklong event, as the former will cover the one-year anniversary of the BP oil spill while the financial news network will debut a documentary that examines America’s love affair with petroleum.
While green marketing can be a tough nut to crack—last week, CBS was blasted for its alleged penchant for “greenwashing,” a charge the broadcaster has vehemently denied—advertisers with eco-friendly products to flog are expected to make a greater investment in measured media in 2011. Per a survey conducted by Kiwano Marketing, 80 percent of marketers said they were looking to “spend more on green marketing in the future.”
Trouble is, most green marketers tend to look to the Internet and print media as the primary vehicles by which to get out their messaging. Only 7 percent of those surveyed by Kiwano said they had money in television.
Although only 15 advertisers have signed up expressly for NBCU’s Green Week play, that’s an improvement of 50 percent from last year’s total. Of the 15, eight are new clients. NBCU said this year’s stunt has generated the highest amount of revenue since it began pitching the concept in 2007.
Among the sponsors who have bought time in Green Week are Honda, Frito-Lay, Sun Products (a manufacturer of eco-friendly laundry detergent), and the group buying service LivingSocial.
