INTRODUCTION:

Remarkable competition is going on among the consumer, industrial and service products. Since society becomes more anxious with the natural environment, businesses have started to adjust their behavior in an attempt to address society's "new" concerns. People are conscious about the less environment friendly product due to their own welfare that is why this issue is very modern topics. Although environmental issues influence all hu man activ ities, few acad emic d isciplin es h ave integ rated g reen issu es in to th eir l i t e r a t u r e . Some businesses have been quick to accept concepts like environmental management systems and waste minimization, and have integrated environmental issues into all organizational activities. This research tried to unearth the relation between green marketing and its realization towards the customer. The like Green Consumerism and Environmental Marketing appear frequently in the popular press. Many governments around the world have become concerned about green mark eting activities an d th ey h av e attemp ted to regulate the m. Peop le are con sciou s about the less environment friendly product due to their own welfare that is why this issue is very modern topic in todays world. Green consumerism creates a balance between the expectations of consumer behaviour and businesses' profit motives. Markets don't wait for slow movers. Businesses that innovate and respond quickly to consumer demands survive best. Everyone has a part to play, at various levels of administration, manufacture and use. A consumer has to realize that he/she not just buys 'a' product, but everything that went into its production, and everything that will happen in the future as a result of that product. All products have an environmental impact, however small. The idea is to reduce it to the minimum.

GREEN CODE:
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G:

Generalizes with care. Consumer behavior will not necessarily be consistent across different product types, and particular market segments may respond to certain issues on the green agenda but not others.

R: Remembers, E: Explores

the validity of a piece of market research is not related to the degree to which it supports your preferred option. the context from which market research data comes. Be clear on the nature of the sample used, the questions asked, the way in which responses were recorded and the time and place from which the responses come.

E:

Ensures that where market research is crossing international border lines, th at the termin o log y and interp retation remains consistent. Ter ms lik e environ men t , green and conservation do not always translate precisely between languages.

N:

Neutrality is important. Ensure that when you pose questions to consumers, that they can make any response without being made to feel guilty or uncomfortable, and ensure that your own preconceptions about the green agenda (such as an assumption that green products will cost extra) are not encoded within the questions.

THE GREEN DILEMMA:

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The past decade has shown that harnessing consumer power to effect positive environmental change is far easier said than done. The so-called "green consumer" movements in the U.S. and other countries have struggled to reach critical mass and to remain in the forefront of shoppers' minds. While public opinion polls taken since the late1980s have shown consistently that a significant percentage of consumers in the U.S. and elsewhere profess a strong willingness to favor environmentally conscious products and companies, consumers' efforts to do so in real life have remained sketchy at best. One of green marketing's challenges is the lack of standards or public consensus about what constitutes "green," according to Joel Makeover, a writer on green marketing. In essence, there is no definition of "how good is good enough" when it comes to a product or company making green marketing claims. This lack of consensus by consumers, marketers, activists, regulators, and influential people has slowed the growth of green products, says Makeover, because companies are often reluctant to promote their green attributes, and consumers are often skeptical about claims. Despite these challenges, green marketing has continued to gain adherents, particularly in light of growing global concern about climate change. This concern has led more companies to advertise their commitment to reduce their climate impacts, and the effect this is having on their products and services.

IMPORTANCE OF GREEN CONSUMERISM:

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Man has limited resources on the earth, with which she/he must attempt to provide for the worlds' unlimited wants. There is extensive debate as to whether the earth is source at man's disposal. In market societies where there is "freedom of choice", it has generally been accepted that individuals and organizations have the right to attempt to have their wants satisfied. As firms face limited natural resources, they must develop new or alternative ways of satisfying these unlimited wants. Ultimately green marketing looks at how marketing activities utilize these limited resources, while satisfying consumers wants, both of individuals and industry, as well as achieving the selling organization's objectives. When looking through the literature there are several suggested reasons for increased use of Green Marketing. Five possible reasons: Organizations perceive environmental marketing to be an opportunity that can be used to achieve its objectives. Organizations believe they have a moral obligation to be more socially responsible. Governmental bodies are forcing firms to become more responsible. Competitors' environmental activities pressure firms to change their environmental marketing activities. Cost factors associated with waste disposal, or reductions in material usage forces firms to modify their behavior opportunities.

CHALLENGES IN GREEN CONSUMERISM:

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 NEED FOR STANDARDIZATION: It is found that only 5% of the marketing messages from Green campaigns are entirely true and there is a lack of standardization to authenticate these claims. There is no standardization to authenticate these claims. There is no standardization currently in place to certify a product as organic. Unless some regulatory bodies are involved in providing the certifications there will not be any verifiable means. A standard quality control board needs to be in place for such labeling and licensing. NEW CONCEPT: Indian literate and urban consumer is getting more aware about the merits of green products. But it is still a new concept for the masses. The consumer needs to be educated and made aware of the environmental threats. The new green movements need to reach the masses and that will take a lot of time and effort. By Indias ayurvedic heritage, Indian consumers do appreciate the importance of using natural and herbal beauty products. Indian consumer is exposed to healthy living lifestyles such as yoga and natural food consumption. In those aspects the consumer is already aware and will be inclined to accept the green products. PATIENCE AND PERSEVERANCE: The investors and corporate need to view the environment as a major long-term investment opportunity; the marketers need to look at the long-term benefits from this new green movement. It will require a lot of patience and no immediate results. Since it is a new concept and idea, it will have its own acceptance period.

AVOIDING GREEN MYOPIA: The first rule of green marketing is focusing on customer benefits i.e. the primary reason why consumers buy certain products in the first place. Do this right, and
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motivate consumers to switch brands or even pay a premium for the greener alternative. It is not going to help if a product is developed which is absolutely green in various aspects but does not pass the customer satisfaction criteria. This will lead to green myopia. Also if the green products are priced very high then again it will lose its market acceptability.

BENEFITS OF GREEN CONSUMERISM:

Todays consumers are becoming more and more conscious about the environment and are also becoming socially responsible. Therefore, more companies are responsible to consumers aspirations for environmentally less damaging or neutral products. Many companies want to have an early mover advantage as they have to eventually move towards becoming green. Some of the advantages of Green Consumerism are: It ensures sustained long-term growth along with profitability. It saves money in the long run, though initially the cost is more. It helps the companies market their products and services keeping the environment aspects in mind. It helps in accessing the new markets and enjoying the competitive advantage. Most of the employees also feel proud and responsible to be working for an environmentally responsible company.

SHIFTING TO A GREEN ERA:

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The color GREEN, until recently was associated all over the world with emerald. In the modern age, however, GREEN is getting associated with sustainable development. Being green is no longer a matter of choice; its marketing is a must, or else enterprise may run the risk of losing customers, employees and shareholders. It has become almost a necessity to maintain a green life style. The possibility of oceans rising and claiming coastal lives, climate change, and polluted air and water are beginning to gain momentum towards the green movement. Today there is an increasing concern among the business houses towards the challenges posed by the environment. Green consumerism is playing a catalytic role to bring in environmentalism and make business green oriented. Also it has been noticed that there has been an increasing trend of consumers demanding for a Green Image of an enterprise. The most feasible option available for the business houses is to put into practice the process of Green Manufacturing. It involves product recovery activities as well as reverses logistics. Product recovery concept is applied on the returned product so as to translate it to a usable one, for example remanufacturing, refurbishing or even recycling. Whereas reverse logistics focuses on inbound supply and distribution of used goods and inventory. Companies like ABB, MUL, Ranbaxy and many more have taken up green projects. They sponsor huge amount and in return earn a lot of goodwill, low cost publicity, and an environment conscious image. Scores of such enterprises have responded to environmental concerns with several strategic versions of green business, which are enumerated below: Adopting products/packages to make them environmentally sound. Making realistic environmental claims about existing products through the advertisements. Linking brands with environmental causes to create goodwill.

ETHICAL CONSUMERISM:
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It is the intentional purchase of products and services that the customer considers to be made ethically. This may mean with minimal harm to or exploitation of humans, animals and/or the natural environment. Ethical consumerism is practiced through 'positive buying' in that ethical products are favored, or 'moral boycott', that is negative purchasing and company-based purchasing. The term "ethical consumer", now used generically, was first popularised by the UK magazine the Ethical Consumer, first published in 1989. Ethical Consumer magazine's key innovation was to produce 'ratings tables,' inspired by the criteria-based approach of the then emerging ethical investment movement. Ethical Consumer's ratings tables awarded companies negative marks (and from 2005 overall scores) across a range of ethical and environmental categories such a 'animal rights', 'human rights' and 'pollution and toxics', empowering consumers to make ethically informed consumption choices and providing campaigners with reliable information on corporate behaviour. Such criteria-based ethical and environmental ratings have subsequently become a commonplace both in providing consumer information and in business-to-business corporate social responsibility and sustainability ratings such as those provided by Innovest, Calvert, Domini, IRRC, TIAA-CREF and KLD Analytics. The rise in ethical consumerism and green brands that identify themselves as ethical, has led to a rise in ethic-based decisions in the mass market, enabled by increased understanding and information about businesses practices. The term ethical consumerism may refer to the wider movement within marketing, which means that large corporations wish to be seen as working ethically and improving the ethical standards of their industry.

THE YEAR OF SHOPPING GREENLY:

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As green consumerism took off in early 1989 the popular media fell over each other in the rush to inform the public about their new responsibility to consume with green discrimination. Numerous articles appeared featuring environmental/consumer experts with trolleys full of supermarket purchases offering advice on exactly what form this discrimination should take. Lists of supposedly good and bad products were presented. One entitled "The shopping list that saves the world." Had Kate Short from the Total Environment Centre making the following recommendations: 1. Cleaning agents, with refills 2. Metal kitchen utensils: tongs, ice cream scoop 3. Glass containers for storage 4. Mild detergent 5. Waxed food wrap instead of plastic 6. Metal garbage bin, bucket, dustpan 7. Straw broom not plastic 8. Natural fibre doormat 9. Pure washing powder, pure antiseptic 10. Tile cleaning; use steel wool with bicarb With the green shopping year in full stride even The Bulletin, a magazine directed to the business community, got so caught up in the general enthusiasm they published an article with a front cover pointer announcing, "Shopping with a conscience. At last, a guide to who's behind the products Australians buy. Do you really want to give your money to companies that pollute, that make excessive profits, which experiment on animals, which mistreat their employees? Now you have the power ..."

Was there a genuine consumer revolution under way? Perhaps. A manufacturer of hamburger packaging called Ozone Packaging took out newspaper advertisements to advertise "The Hamburger That Saved the World. You don't have to change the way you live to do the right thing by the environment. Keep on eating hamburgers. But make sure they come in Ozone take-away packaging." Spurred into action McDonalds went one better advertising "Our Packaging has changed. It's A Wrap. .... McDonald's will continue to pursue the most environmentally sound operating practices and procedures possible to protect the global environment on which we all depend. High level business conferences were organised to discuss the situation. One entitled "The Green Consumer Revolution" was endorsed by the Australian Marketing Institute and featured Professor David Bellamy from the Conservation Foundation, London as the environmental conscience. He was accompanied on the program by marketing experts speaking on subjects like, "How Australian Companies Can Benefit From Seizing the Environmental Initiative Now" and "Who Is the Green Consumer? Understanding The Real Impact Of The Green Attitude On Purchasing Behaviour", and "Pricing: Is The Environmentally Friendly Product Cost-Effective?" In 1989 it sure looked as if the suits were dressing themselves in green. Or was it jungle camouflage?

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CONCLUSIONS:
Followings conclusions can be drawn from the study: Looking to the significant awareness about green marketing prevailing among the customers, the firm must adopt suitable green marketing strategies. The middle aged segment, urban segment and four wheeler segments of the study exhibit more awareness as compared to the younger people and people with rural back ground as well as owners of two wheelers. There ore, programmers creating awareness about green products are needed in these less aware segments. The green technologies in the automobile sectors cannot be allowed at the cost of an increased price tag of the green products, only because they offer a sustainable product. But to the contrary other methods like use of economies of scale should be used to avoid undue escalations of prices. This shall serve the dual purpose of keeping the price low and also of that recovering the cost associated with development of green technology. Finally, it is felt that green marketing will lead to all round development of the society. This study is likely to help the marketers to design the marketing strategies so that benefits of the green products are continuously demonstrated in their product promotions. For e.g. the green automobile can first be launched in the premium segment and then once the infrastructure is in place, it can go for full market coverage

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