I spent a couple of days at the Consumer Electronics Show earlier this month mainly with our long-time client Panasonic. Their booth was rich with cool new products including their remarkable 103″ Plasma TV which is bigger than my first New York apartment. One of the side rooms in the Panasonic booth showcased a high-end surround sound system created with recording wiz Elliot Shiner–each of five jazz musicians including Shiner played on their own plasma so you were completed surrounded visually and aurally. This was definitely an engaging experience.
Right around the corner from the Shiner experience was a small section that highlighted Matsushita Electric’s (Panasonic parent company) environmental efforts including the elimination of lead from all their TV’s. With everyone seemingly buying new flat-screens, it is easy to imagine tons of old tubes hitting the dumps. This is not a pretty picture given all the toxins including lead that used to be inside TVs. According to the Business Week article I mentioned yesterday, Matsushita is producing “state of the art green products” and “eliminated 96% of the most toxic substances in its global operations.” Matsushita has not made a huge deal out of this approach but I suspect those that really care will find out and be more favorably inclined to buy Panasonic instead of a less eco-friendly competitor. Certainly makes me feel good about working with them.