Richard Seireeni’s The Gort Cloud is two books. One is a collection of case studies on building and differentiating green brands. The other introduces a “vast and largely invisible” network of stakeholders centered around sustainability – the Gort Cloud. Each would make for a great standalone volume.
Twelve case studies covering 23 green brands take up roughly 80% of the book, highlighting ways these companies have differentiated themselves and succeeded (or not) in their respective marketplaces through sustainability. The case studies span a broad spectrum: products and services; business-to-consumer and business-to-business; household goods, energy, finance, transportation, real estate, apparel, and food/beverage. Naturally, I was most curious about the brands with a Portland, Oregon connection, which allowed me to backfill gaps in my knowledge: Bonneville Environmental Foundation (inventors of carbon offsets), Ecotrust, Nau, Portfolio 21 Investments, and ShoreBank Pacific.
Why read the case studies? Seireeni posits that the success (or failure) of green brands rests squarely on a large support network of stakeholders in sustainability, including businesses and business alliances, advocacy groups, government, certifying organizations, foundations, news organizations, information and education purveyors, publishers and publications, trendspotters, conferences and trade shows, blogs, nonprofits, media, guides, and many others. Together, they comprise the Gort Cloud (green + Oort cloud), which all green brands must factor into their strategy in order to succeed. It remains to be seen whether the new term catches on.
It makes perfect sense that eco-brands achieved their success in the context of a larger network with sustainability as the common thread. Companies need markets and market infrastructure to exist. To state that links exist between the showcased companies and the Gort Cloud and to actually describe and explain the dynamics of those relationships are two different things, however. Hints and mentions and anecdotal evidence are the right first steps in an in-depth analysis, but they remain the only ones here. Seireeni outlines at the outset how the book’s focus changed as his research proceeded, which is the likely reason for the book’s duality and the missed analytical opportunity.
The book’s principal value is twofold:
- Graphic representation of the Gort Cloud, which is a powerful tool and which offers an excellent context for thinking and working in sustainability.
- Stories of ecopreneurs, which demonstrate the passion, dedication, and drive of new sustainability pioneers, and which should serve as an inspiration for creating values-driven businesses.
***
Richard Seireeni with Scott Fields, The Gort Cloud: The Invisible Force Powering Today’s Most Visible Green Brands, White River Junction: Chelsea Green, 2008.
Disclosure: I received The Gort Cloud as a review copy from Chelsea Green.
Publishers: Email me to discuss reviews of your new offerings in marketing or sustainability.
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
I read about the Gort Cloud in another post a while back and was so interested I ordered it! But it never showed. After reading it, Peter, do you think it’s worth a retry on the order?
@Park Howell It could be useful if you were teaching a course or writing a book on sustainable branding and needed case studies.