Why Greenwashing? Because It Works

I recently went to a local cultural event (West Coast Live at SFMOMA) a few weeks ago and while waiting for the show to begin, two women seated nearby struck up a conversation. I told them about the wine app I'm writing which prompted one of them to start telling me about the wonderful heirloom tomato event at Kendall Jackson (Sept. 10).

She said they had organic tomatoes.

I said, did she know how many thousands of hilltop acres Kendall Jackson clearcut to make vineyards? About the hundres of oak trees they cut down in Sonoma and Santa Barbara Counties, prompting angry public outcries from the locals who tried to pass legislation to prevent such abused in the future?

And how KJ had nary a single organically grown wine for sale? Which meant it was using large amounts of Roundup on its 14,000 acres...

She was quiet. Literally speechless. Her enthusiasm had turned to shock. Not disbelief - just the anger at having been greenwashed.

We're besieged with all that folksy, wine dog, aw jes folks here imagery over and over - so many distractions. Not reality.

I've found not a single photo of pesticides being sprayed or of pesticide protection gear in searching online.

If you have photos, please send them. Their absence says it all. Even the search engines have been scrubbed.

And the next time a winery puts on a tomato festival, ask yourselves why.