The Green Claims Code in Plain English

If your business makes any kind of environmental claim, from “recyclable” to “carbon neutral,” there is a piece of UK guidance you cannot afford to ignore. It is called the Green Claims Code, and the good news is that it is mostly common sense. The better news is that following it makes your marketing stronger, not weaker.

Here it is, in plain English.

The core principles explained

Claims must be truthful and accurate. This sounds obvious, and it is where most businesses come unstuck, usually by accident. If you say something is recyclable, it has to be recyclable in practice, not just in theory, and by the customer, not just a specialist facility on the other side of the country.

Claims must be clear and unambiguous. No vague halo words that let the reader assume more than you mean. “Green,” “eco,” and “sustainable” on their own are exactly the kind of language the Code is wary of, because they can mean almost anything, and a reader will always fill the gap with the most generous reading.

Claims must not leave out important information. You cannot highlight one good thing and stay quiet about a significant bad one. If your product is recyclable but only a tiny fraction ever gets recycled in reality, hiding that context is the sort of half-truth the Code exists to catch.

Comparisons must be fair. If you claim to be better than a rival or a previous version, the comparison has to be like for like, and you have to be able to prove it. Comparing your greenest line against someone else’s worst is exactly the sort of sleight of hand it rules out.

Claims must consider the full life cycle. A product is not sustainable just because one stage of it is. The Code expects you to think about the whole journey, from materials to disposal, before you make a sweeping claim. A recycled bottle flown around the world is not a simple win, and pretending it is invites trouble.

Evidence is always essential

And crucially, you must be able to back it all up with evidence. If you cannot prove it, you cannot say it. That is the heart of the whole thing, and it is worth pinning above your desk.

None of this should feel threatening. In fact, businesses that take the Code seriously tend to end up with better marketing, because it forces exactly the discipline that builds trust: specifics over slogans, honesty over hype, evidence over adjectives.

A simple shortcut for claims

If all six principles feel like a lot to hold in your head at once, there is a shortcut that captures most of them. Before any claim goes out, ask three plain questions. Is it true, and can I show it? Is it clear, or could a reader reasonably take it to mean more than I do? Have I left out anything that would change how it reads? Get honest answers to those three and you will have caught the overwhelming majority of the trouble the Code is designed to prevent, long before a regulator ever needs to.

Treat the Green Claims Code not as a restriction but as a quality standard for your environmental messaging. Meet it, and you protect yourself from complaints and regulators. More than that, you produce claims your customers can actually believe, which is the whole point of making them. If you would like a second pair of eyes on your green claims before they go out, that is a job we are always happy to do.