Did Brita's FilterForGood Campaign Bottle Up the Truth?

Suzanne Dunn/The Post-Standard

With Americans discarding billions of water bottles every year, a campaign to reduce water bottle waste is certainly a worthy cause. As the Website FilterForGood notes "(T)he United States is the world’s largest bottled water consumer. In 2008, the U.S. used enough plastic water bottles to stretch around the Earth more than 190 times."


Clearly, an effort reduce water bottle waste is needed because, in an economy where energy costs are soaring, FilterForGood tells us "It takes 2,000 times more energy to produce a bottle of water than it does to produce tap water...Many people intend to recycle disposable water bottles; however, 69% of bottled water containers end up in the trash and not in a recycling container."

At first glance, water purification system maker Brita's campaign(which includes the FilterForGood Web site) to persuade consumers not to purchase water bottled in plastic seems above reproach, but as Case 3-A "Corporate Responsibility: Just Sales or Doing Well by Doing Good" points out, there are aspects of it that bear closer examination.

Though I was once a journalist, I've worked in public relations/corporate communications for the last decade, so I've decided to use the Public Relations Society of America's Code of Ethics as a way to dissect this issue.

Within the code is the "Member Statement of Professional Values," with "advocacy" being first among these. The FilterForGood campaign certainly positions Brita as an advocate for an issue that affects many communities in the U.S. and worldwide - litter generated from disposable water bottles.

Additionally, Brita fulfills the next principle, "honesty," which includes "advancing the interests of those we represent and in communicating with the public" by clearing labeling the FilterForGood Website with its corporate logo. It's as clear as purified water that Brita's goal is two-fold - to advocate for a good cause while providing a compelling sales argument for its own products, which include water filtration systems and containers.

However, as the case study notes, replacing disposable water bottles through use of Brita products brings up an important consideration not clearly addressed on the FilterForGood site - how to recycle used Brita filters. The case study also discusses how journalists from the New York Times reported how Brita products were not recyclable, a point reinforced by Beth Terry, founder of www.TakeBacktheFilter.org.

In the case study, Terry is quoted as saying "to give up bottled water, you have to switch to another plastic products that's not recyclable," but it seems that Brita has since realized this conundrum and launched its own initiatives to prevent its products from trashing Mother Earth.

In fact, the home page of TakeBacktheFilter.org announces that "Brita and Preserve (a manufacturer of 100-percent recycled household products) Announce Filter Recycling Program." And while it's a little more difficult to find recycling information on FilterForGood's site, it is there under "Our Partners."


The PRSA Code of Ethics also contains a provision to "to aid informed decision-making" and Brita's FilterForGood campaign certainly makes a strong case that reducing the use of plastic water bottles is in every human's best interest but unless one has read the case study, the issue of how to recycle Brita filters and containers is not addressed.

But unlike the New York Times journalists in the case study, who endeavored to tell the complete story of FilterForGood, PR probationers owe allegiance not to the truth, but to their clients. While the PRSA Code of Ethics contains good guidance, those principles may not be acceptable to a company paying an agency to promote its products or position it as a force for good. The PRSA code even goes so far as to highlight "Examples of Improper Conduct" with each provision listed, but it doesn't address how to deal with a client who may demand such conduct.

PRSA has been clear on more black-and-white ethical issue such as representing dictators, including in a recent Financial Times letter to the editor from PRSA Chair and Chief Executive Rosanna M. Fiske stating a NYC-based PR firm's efforts on behalf of Libyan strongman Muammer Gaddafi and his government, calling them "distinctly against the ethical tenets of modern public relations."

Students who plan a career in PR should be well aware of the possibility their own ethics and principles may be challenged from time to time by clients venturing into "gray" areas, which is why it is important to explore issues through education and professional development.

Interestingly, the case study seems to illustrate a conflict between Kant’s Categorical Imperative (focusing on the action of reducing plastic water bottle waste) and Mill’s Utility Principle (focusing on the outcome of replacing plastic water bottles with a non-recyclable alternative, a Brita product). While this might have been true when the FilterForGood campaign was first launched, my research found that Brita's executives realized the competing ethical and practical issues and subsequently created useful programs and initiatives to recycle company products.