I must admit to a bit of confusion about the new advertising campaign from NRMA about the 'Carbonators'. The premise behind the campaign is that if you move your insurance from another supplier to NRMA, they will off-set one tonne of your vehicles emissions for you for free.
On the face of it, that sounds great. Except in my opinion, the whole campaign raises more questions than it asks. Sure, NRMA want people to be engaged with the concept of 'doing your bit for the environment' and they want to make their product eco-friendly, but this is still just car insurance. Its great that we have this secondary feeling of well-being, but the most important thing to anyone hunting car insurance, is that its cheap and it covers you for an accident. All-singing and dancing it doesn't need to be.
The detail that you only get to see if you access the website and click through the right areas and onto two more '?' buttons that aren't very well displayed, is that NRMA will invest in purchasing carbon credits in a number of different ways. One of those is 'sequestration of forests as certified under the NSW Greenhouse Gas Abatement scheme.' I mean, what??
I'm all for campaigns that make you think, but in this case they really should have followed the advice of the word K.I.S.S - keep it simple, stupid. I'm postively disposed to doing something about the environment but I have no idea how much one tonne is, what the NSW Greenhouse Gas Abatement scheme is or exactly how I check that my investment in growing more trees is actually investing in growing more trees. Someone could be charging 3 different customers for the same tree for all I know.
Sure it sounds cynical, and the website and the adverts with the images of 'trusted' Broncos players should develop some faith in you that NRMA can be trusted, but would it be too much to maybe simplify the message a little? Maybe explain to us up-front how much our cars produce in the way of emissions, without us having to go into the website and mess about entering all our details?
Either way, I'm not sold. I've just forked out $4000 to make my house save gallons of water should it ever decide to rain again. Sure I want to help reduce greenhouse gases, but pay more to do so?
Maybe later. Maybe when I've paid for the water tank. Or maybe I'll just pick the cheapest quote. Tough call.
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I'm SKD. Who the hell are you?
- SKD
- Brisbane, Queensland, Australia
- SKD was born in the spring of 1974. While he was screaming his way into existance, somewhere in Hertfordshire, Victoria Adams aka Posh Spice was also uttering the first vocal sounds that would eventually reach the ears of the global audience by way of the lyrics 'I tell you what I want, what I really really want.' SKD is also lucky enough to share his birthday with Sean Bean, Jan Hammer of Miami Vice theme fame and Nikita Khrushchev. It's a mixed bag. He grew up in the mean streets of Bromley, London (or Kent as some people insist) where he traded blows with his brother as they developed their boxing skills with socks as gloves on the end of hands. These days he resides in Brisbane, Australia which is decidely lacking in any culture whatsoever, but makes up for that in cheap booze, great pubs, liberal gambling laws and a number of excellent strip clubs. His wife frequently shakes her head in disgust/shame/sympathey at him.
Photos from Carbon Images
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