February 7th, 2006

The Super Bowl goes green

I hope all the football fans enjoyed this year’s Super Bowl. I personally watch it every year to see the ads — and enjoy an excuse to gorge on lots of snack food. But this year’s game was particularly interesting, especially for folks involved in green business.

Despite the ads and sponsorship of the game by super-sized SUVs, three major automakers all promoted specifically green products. Both Ford and Toyota promoted their hybrid car models, while GM announced the launch of their “Live Green, Go Yellow” campaign to promote models that can run on a mix of corn-based fuel (just those three 30-second spots add about $7.5 million to the annual amount spent on green marketing). If you didn’t catch the game, or if you were up grabbing another organic beer, you’re in luck. Google Video has all of the Super Bowl ads available to watch for free, here.

To top it off, Sustainablog points out that this Super Bowl was played on “one of the greenest stadiums in the country.” Detroit’s Ford Field was built with a playing surface made of recycled tires, and uses recycled steel, concrete and glass from an old warehouse. And, according the Super Bowl’s own website, the game went “Carbon Neutral” by planting trees to offset the game’s emissions.

You can’t get a more mainstream, American media event than the Super Bowl. And seeing all of the green advertising makes me think we are very close to a tipping point.