Over 30 years, EWG has developed multiple audiences it considers when trying to reach the public. The science teams are thinking about the regulatory process and how to influence the EPA and other regulatory agencies to make moves that improve public health. Communications thinks about the media and what they need to know to communicate these issues to their readers and viewers. But the general public is also a direct audience for EWG, and that’s the role of the Digital team, to think about what regular people need to know about any one issue.
So when, for example, the Science Investigations team finds PFAS in drinking water, the question becomes not just what to say about it, but to whom. Sometimes there isn’t an immediate market solution – you can’t shop your way out of exposure to these chemicals. Sometimes you need regulatory change. Sometimes you need media pressure to create the conditions where change is possible. Sometimes you need a direct-to-consumer campaign. The science must be relevant and accessible to every audience EWG communicates with.
The commitment to inclusivity means a commitment to democratization, ensuring that clean beauty, organic food and safe household products are not just available to the wealthy or hyper-educated but to everyday families. It’s one of the toughest technical challenges EWG takes on – how to help brands introduce better products to a wider market.
EWG has the infrastructure to work with larger companies, such as Johnson & Johnson and Proctor & Gamble, that aren’t known as clean but are known as affordable. When brands get the EWG seal of approval, consumers just see an affordable safer product on familiar shelves, they don’t see the years of collaborative, rigorous science behind its development.
Of course, that very first overarching goal of EWG – to improve public health outcomes – foreshadowed the day ubiquitous household bargain brands from California to Korea would have to compete to meet the standards set by EWG. If clean beauty has an unreasonable cost of entry, those public health outcomes aren’t going to budge. So EWG went to work — and once again changed the global market to demand it.