Can a Fossil Fuel Manufacturer Really Go Green?

Exxon/Mobil makes a beautiful play on words to change perception of their global impact.

For the past several years science has focused and identified the principle cause of global warming as the amount of CO2 being released into the atmosphere. Of course, there are many culprits in that arena, automotive, agriculture, energy production and manufacturing. Since Exxon is one of the largest producers of fossil fuels in the world it’s pretty difficult to escape their connection to the automotive and energy production industries. But in an effort to look like there is some concern on their part for CO2 emissions they have produced a commercial to demonstrate their research and development in the area of manufacturing.

I don’t want to talk about whether the commercial is accurate or what impact this supposed new technology will have, I really just want to focus on the creative and the execution. In fact, I think there is some brilliance in this commercial in taking the word “plant” and applying a double entendre to juxtapose a living plant and a manufacturing plant. This spot is completely done with animation in order to fuse the living plant concept to the manufacturing plant. The use of white in the representation of the manufacturing plant is a smart way to create a perception of being clean. And the copy delivered by the female VO is well written to make the point yet is almost as if Mother Nature is narrating the cleaner efforts in approval.

I’ve worked on manufacturing accounts in the past and trying to make this kind of connection in not easy, for the client or for the consumer. The client doesn’t want to tell the whole story and the consumer doesn’t believe the propaganda anyway. But I am impressed that this spot strikes a very cool balance of concept, copy and visual that are engaging, thoughtful and almost believable. At least they appear to have made a real effort to speak to an audience that, in most instances, loathes their existence by acknowledging that science keeps pointing a finger at them and they must appear to heed and respond to the growing public opinion that supports such science. They can’t say much about their automotive or energy production connections so at least they have found one area that they can try to show some interest in addressing this global problem. They have artfully planted their flag there.