The first post in this series, Nobody’s Buying It: Rethinking Consumer Carbon Offsets, talked about the failure of carbon offsets as a consumer item. While there is cause for optimism on corporate offsetting, purchases by private individuals make up a meager 10% of sales.

This is surprising because many consumer eco products have succeeded, from hybrid cars to fair trade chocolate to free range eggs. For items such as these, between 1% and 40% of consumers make the “ethical” choice, compared to just 0.01% who choose to buy offsets.

So why are free range (or cage free) eggs so much more successful than carbon offsets? Is it a matter of time, that offsets are too new? Perhaps, but I don’t think that’s the whole answer. I also don’t believe we care more about chickens than the future well-being of humanity.

Consumer offsets are failing because they are badly packaged, marketed and sold.

Let’s go back to free range eggs, which capture 40% of the UK market. Joe is in the supermarket, and knows he needs some eggs. On the shelf he is confronted by an array of choices, and decides to buy a dozen white (size A). A dozen regular eggs of that variety cost just $3, while the free range equivalent is $5.

Let’s say Joe is one of the 40% who choose the free range variety. Why on earth would he spend $2 extra? What went through his mind in making that decision?

If Joe is anything like me, he thinks about some chickens cooped up in barn, and about other chickens frolicking in a field. He reckons $2 is not a lot of money to make some chickens happy. He might also persuade himself that happy chickens lay slightly superior eggs. He thinks, “I know it’s not the cheapest option, but $5 for a dozen eggs still feels reasonable to me, and I get to do some good in the process.”

Joe spent some money, got some eggs, and (as a bonus) feels good about himself.

But what if free range eggs were marketed like carbon offsets?

To start with, there would be no free range eggs on the shelf. So Joe would pick up a $3 box of regular battery eggs. But Joe definitely knows about cooped up chickens, since their plight has been recently highlighted by massive media coverage. It makes Joe sad when he thinks of the chickens, but still, he needs some eggs, so what can he do? After all, he has a cake to bake for his daughter. He wants to make her smile, and that’s worth more than the price of a few chickens suffering.

But that’s not the end of it. In response to the plight of battery chickens, some well meaning people have set up a chicken charity.

The chicken charity pays egg farmers to move their chickens from barns into open fields. Converting to free range is expensive, so the charity covers the farmers’ costs. The financial support is vital because the farmer gets no benefit from going free range – the eggs are packaged and sold just like regular ones.

The charity sets up a website to collect money from people like Joe. The site is full of information about chickens suffering, and explains exactly what happens to money donated. It contains detailed calculations which show that for just $2 per dozen eggs, you can precisely “offset” the misery caused by the eggs you buy.

The charity’s site (www.chickenneutral.org) invites Joe to visit annually, and work out how many eggs he’s purchased during the past year. Joe reckons it’s 30 dozen, so after filling out the form, the site suggests he pays $60 to help farmers move their chickens out of barns. To sweeten the deal, they’ll send Joe a certificate to put on his fridge, to show his personal contribution to chicken well-being.

Do you think Joe would give $60 annually to the chicken charity?

In the majority of cases, the answer is obviously no. While there are many charities that deal with animal welfare, they aren’t supported by 40% of the public. There’s no reason to think that an egg-laying chicken charity would do any better.

But why not? In terms of costs and benefits, Joe’s choice is exactly the same as in the (real) supermarket. Costs: either pay $2 extra per dozen at the time of purchase, or else pay $2 per dozen online, once a year. Benefits: either support free range chickens by buying their eggs, or else pay to set some battery chickens free. In both cases, the overall difference to global chicken suffering is identical, as is the cost to Joe.

So what’s holding Joe back? Why would he buy free range eggs, but not give an equivalent annual donation to the chicken charity?

And to reverse our thought experiment:

What if carbon offsets were sold more like free range eggs?

Next in series: A Feeble Pitch