John Elkington Quotes

#1. I'm worried about greenwashing. I think we should come down on it very, very hard, whether it's with criminal intent or actively deceptive.

John Elkington

#2. Behavioral change is more important than individual product choices. They both have a role to play.

John Elkington

#3. Any prudent business looks at the reality and how to maximize our investment.

John Elkington

#4. I became a vegetarian 55 years ago, and I think it's one of the more important behavioral changes I ever took. The more I see of the beef industry and so on, I believe that to be true.

John Elkington

#5. The biggest weakness of the green-consumer movement, always, is that we tend to pick the easy-to-do things because that's where we can most readily engage people. It doesn't cost them very much to switch products or whatever it happens to be.

John Elkington

#6. I think consumerism breeds dissatisfaction, and I think that the advertisers play to that. So I cannot be comfortable with that. On the other hand, the cornucopia of products and innovation - I love Apple, for example. That's a temple of consumerism in many ways.

John Elkington

#7. What people say often precedes what they think. Some people sometimes say, "I have to hear myself talk before I know what I think." I think language sometimes, because it opens new channels, it opens new doors, is enormously important.

John Elkington

#8. I think that consumerism is intrinsically a pretty flawed social system.

John Elkington

#9. I think people often underestimate the power of consumers. But I equally say that consumers are like shock troops: You can't keep them agitated and motivated and committed and active forever. There are pulses where they switch on to a particular issue, and just inevitably they switch off.

John Elkington

#10. I'm part of the consumer culture. I was part of the baby boom generation. I have a car when I shouldn't, a couple of computers; I can't be anti-consumerist in that sense.

John Elkington