Public relations on the environment pulls up short on the Sunbeam shelf at David Jones

We recorded here that we’d been surprised at electrical goods supplier Sunbeam chief executive David Jackson’s declaration that he had no policy to spout on the company’s environmental undertakings and that we had better take our enquiry to its owner, GUD Holdings, and its chief executive Ian Campbell.

Today, we were even more surprised at Campbell’s curt dismissal. As the inevitable final investor relations front for his company, we’d have expected a little more attempt at polish in his replies. And, after all, he called us, so he clearly wanted to say something.

Campbell described the few simple questions Cloud Citizen had posed as aggressive. I explained I was only doing my job, as a journalist, on a challenging subject. We have no need to pull punches, and these are after all tough questions on a serious subject. Cloud Citizen is not the Australian Women’s Weekly.

When we suggested the issue of concern to Cloud Citizen’s investigation lay in Sunbeam’s sales at David Jones, Campbell asserted that his company complied with all the ASX listing rules. That was hardly the question. He said the company did nothing to break the law. I hadn’t suggested it did.

I asked if he would characterise his business’s standing on the environment as “compliance-only”; he said his company complies with the laws and doesn’t break any. Again, this was hardly the subject, nor the question.

When I asserted that there was a lot of skin to be lost for his business on the environment and asked could Campbell not lose out to competitors, he professed himself unconcerned. I asked him who he considered his competitors to be, and he suggested I pick up the phone book and find out.

He clearly didn’t like it when I asked him, was he not concerned about climate change; was he a climate-change denier? He replied, “When you have something sensible to ask me, call me back,” and abruptly put the phone down.

So, there you have it. If you think David Jones’ own undertakings on the environment are a bit short, just look at this from one of its key suppliers. Apparently, this passes for investor relations at Sunbeam and GUD.

Such dismissive behaviour certainly doesn’t help the department store’s own claims about its “whole-of-business” environment strategy (sic). And Campbell’s entitlement is apparently to keep on running a business from the past, despite the concerns of anyone else for its externalities.

So, there’s a simple message here for the interested. If you care about the climate and environment, believe that business is a contributor and you have to replace your electrical goods anytime soon, you might wish to consider a brand other than Sunbeam.