Tuesday is Earth Day, the annual celebration held to raise awareness of environmental issues and promote environmental protection. Since it was first celebrated in 1970, Earth Day has been designed for people to reflect on, debate about and take action to fix the problems facing the natural world.
The awareness celebration has also provided a great opportunity for green-leaning companies to invent new ways to showcase and promote their conservation efforts. In honor of Earth Day 2014, let's take a look at how different companies and organizations are communicating their stewardship messages:
Apple: This year's official Earth Day theme (as decided by the Earth Day Network) is "green cities," a great tie-in for Apple as the company is currently building a new, environmentally-focused campus in Cupertino. One of the main focuses of the new project is on powering the new facility with green energy. The company also recently hired former EPA head Lisa Jackson to oversee a team in charge of corporate environmental responsibilities.
On Tuesday, Apple stores across the world will mark Earth Day by covering their logos with green, and employees will wear special shirts to make the occasion. Apple will also be hosting a large, Earth Day-focused internal event on Tuesday afternoon in Cupertino. And on Monday the company overhauled its Environmental Responsibility website, posting this video about its conservation efforts.
NASA: NASA's successful foray into social media (if you don't follow NASA's Goddard Space Flight Station on Instagram, you should) continues on Earth Day, with the organization inviting people to send in selfies taken in their respective environments with special printable signs. NASA will then to combine each of these images and release a "blue marble" mosaic of the Earth built from the collected images.
The organization says that the selfie project is designed to encourage environmental awareness and recognize the agency's ongoing work to protect the planet. The United States Environmental Protection Agency and The Nature Conservancy are also supporting people taking selfies outside on Tuesday, asking followers to use the hashtag #NatureSelfie.
Kohl's: Taking selfies and wearing special Earth Day shirts aside, Kohl's is encouraging people to take action in their communities, with its own employees setting the example. Throughout the month of April, Kohl's employees will volunteer for projects including the removal of invasive species and planting native vegetation with Tree Musketeers in Los Angeles and the creation of an outdoor classroom with the Urban Ecology Center in Milwaukee.
In addition, the company is donating corporate grants expected to total more than $2 million to environmentally-focused organizations like Habitat for Humanity and the Detroit Zoological Society.
Follow Brian Greene: @bwilliamgreene
Great article! I think it is important for companies to show how they are impacting the world in other means than consumers would expect, such as supporting Earth Day.