Even ethics has a price

Even in this post-Blair world everybody seems to want to 'do the right thing' or at least be seen to be doing the right thing - whatever this mythical right thing is.

This has manifested itself in retailers attempting to serve an audience that says it wants no more carrier bags, less packaging, less air miles, more locally-sourced foods, less carbon footprints, more Fairtrade products, more organic goods - you get the gist.

The only problem with this is that as we are now in the midst of a downturn when the pennies are becoming ever-tighter and past experience has shown that when consumers are strapped for cash they will buy on the basis of price rather than on the provenance or ethical stance of products.

In the US Citigroup Global Markets recently found that if food prices continue to rise further then 25 per cent of shoppers said they would start to buy their groceries at cheaper stores. This compares with the 12 per cent that have already begun to shop at such stores. In addition, Citigroup found that there had also been a reduction in spending on non-essential goods such as wine and chocolates as well as a trading-down to cheaper alternative foodstuffs.

So while consumers might like to purchase greener products they could ultimately end up forgoing that Fairtrade tea, Ecover cleaning products, locally grown asparagus, and organic tomatoes (which are never the cheapest options), in favour of less costly and possibly in some cases less-environmentally friendly products where ethics is far from being the key selling point.