December 7, 2007

Forest Ethics Releases Naughty And Nice List, Gives Sears Lump Of Coal

Forest Ethics and its Catalog Cutdown campaign have released its annual Naughty and Nice list (PDF), which grades catalog senders on environmental paper practices. The group also continued its campaign against Sears by staging protests at more than 70 Sears stores across North America. The protesters dressed as reindeer and delivered lumps of coal in response to what Forest Ethics calls “Sears’ refusal to abandon the outdated and destructive paper policies of the past.”

The group says that activists sang “I saw Sears Cut Trees for Catalogs” (to the tune of “I saw Mommy kissing Santa Claus”), and unveiled a banner reading “Sears has been Naughty to the Environment.”

Chicago-based Sears Holdings Corporation, with catalog offerings including Sears, Lands’ End and the recently acquired K-Mart, ranks among the top catalog producers in North America. Forest Ethics says that the catalogs are made up of trees cut from endangered forests and have “little to no recycled content.”

The group has had a number of successful campaigns against catalog companies. Limited Brands (parent company of Victoria’s Secret, Express, Bath & Body Works, and The Limited), for example, signed a new forest policy following a long Forest Ethics’ campaign.

In its Naughty and Nice list, 21 companies were evaluated according to four criteria: whether or not endangered forests are cut to produce the company’s catalogs; whether the company uses Forest Stewardship Council Certified paper; the amount of post-consumer recycled content in the company’s catalogs; and the extent of the company’s efforts to reduce overall paper consumption.

Patagonia, Williams-Sonoma, Victoria’s Secret (see link above), Dell, Timberland, Crate & Barrel, REI, L.L. Bean, and J. Crew ended up on the nice list.

JC Penney, Macy’s/Bloomingdales, and PC Mall made the checking twice list.

Neiman Marcus, Talbots/J. Jill, OfficeMax, Lands’ End, Eddie Bauer, School Specialty, Sharper Image, Spiegel, and Sears follow up on the naughty list.

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