“Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain!”

Remember that?

Turns out the Wizard of Oz wasn’t such a wizard, after all. And all Dorothy Gale and her pals the Scarecrow, the Tin Man and the Cowardly Lion had to do was peek behind the velvet drapery to discover the disappointing truth: the Wizard was a charlatan who just happened to be good at marketing and who owned a hot air balloon.

News alert: Consumers can — and will — see behind the curtain. And will ignore exhortations to ignore what they see.

Increasingly, we all want to align ourselves with brands that make the world a better place. (Or, at a bare minimum, that do no harm. But, honestly, that’s setting the bar awfully low. Speaking for Storytegic, we want to rock ‘n roll, not just shuffle our feet.)

And this fact is just as true in bad times (economic recession, times of high inflation and low employment) as in good.

Good citizenship is a key — and vital — dimension in brand strategy. Why? Because people — like us and like you — will choose good over bad every time.

One of the questions we are frequently asked when we speak about this with clients or at conferences, etc., is some variation on the following:

“Sure, this makes sense. And for that artisan goat cheese maker in Rutland, Vermont (fist pump Vermont!), this is cool. But isn’t it all a crock of you know what for big business? Like, write a check and feel okay about what you’re doing? and keep on wrecking the environment in pursuit of profit?”

That is the whole point. If all a brand is doing is writing a check, that does NOT count as good citizenship. No way. Good citizenship is about putting sustainability into the brand. Some call this triple bottom line: a measure of sustainability that includes financial, social and environmental performance measures. And, no, it is not just for that goat cheese farm in Rutland.

Here is an example of brand citizenship. It’s used a lot because it involves one of the planet’s biggest brands: Coca-Cola. NOT a brand everyone naturally goes to for proof of do-gooder-ship.

“The key ingredient in Coca-Cola is water, so that’s our number one priority. With regard to reducing our footprint and expanding our handprint, we are making clean water available to the communities we serve through partnerships,” said Neville Isdell, the Chairman of the Board of Coca-Cola. He further noted that those partnerships include the World Wildlife Fund, USAID and the Gates Foundation.

So what’s going on here? Is Coke getting out of the soft drink business? Is Coke going earthy-crunchy? Maybe moving into goat cheese? Relocating to Vermont? Should we alert CNN? NO. The company has made a strategic business decision to link what it makes to making the world a better place. That decision is now part of the brand identity — who the company is — and what it wants to be known for. Sustainability is becoming part of the brand DNA.

Here’s the key point. We’re borrowing it from Allen Adamson of Landor, from his book, “The Edge”: “The objective of this alignment of philanthropy and business is to help consumers differentiate the brand from the others in the beverage aisle.”

Does it sell more soft drinks? Yes. Does it help the planet? Yes. We’d be naive if we said it’s only about the latter. It isn’t. Business is in business to stay in business, so to speak. BUT, when a company steps out from behind that curtain and start being more transparent, starts focusing on triple bottom line thinking, BOTH are possible: selling more product AND helping the planet.

There are other examples, of course. And the number of brands committing to brand citizenship (also called good citizenry) is growing every day.

The days of hiding behind the curtain are over. WHOO HOO! That means business, a massive and powerful and dynamic confluence of resources, talent and capital, will increase its commitment and role in helping to solve the world’s problems.

We’ll say it again: Brand: Way more than a logo! And not just in Vermont, either.