With the entire world going green, banks have also jumped on the green train. It appears that our banks are now publicly supporting a good cause. Not only does our bank charge us monthly fees, they also want to hit us up for monthly donations towards their charity of choice.
Last Friday I was away from my bank branch for a conference. I forgot my debit card at home, and therefore, I went into a branch with two pieces of identification to withdraw money. My employer is not my primary financial institution, and I haven’t been to a bank branch as a client in almost 4 years.
I was pleasantly surprised to see posters for my banks charity and environmental fund beside the advertising posters for a new travel credit card and their new cash-back mortgage promotion. Has hell really frozen over? Are the tin-men of financial institutions starting to grow hearts, or it is just all for good publicity? Maybe the heartless bank feels that if they show a bit of compassion their clients will show them more money.
If your bank supports a charity, do you make monthly donations to support your banks good cause?
Here are the charities supported and founded by some of our financial institutions:
RBC is concerned about The Environment and their Carbon Footprint. They discuss Climate Change Solutions in detail on their website. Their Canadian website focuses on their founded Blue Water Fund and that they were named as one of Canada’s Top 100 Greenest Employers. Those of you who are familiar with RBC their colours are blue and yellow. They created The Blue Water Fund. Is the blue significant of clean water or is it representing the RBC brand?
HSBC is The World’s Local Bank and their brand color is red. What environmental or social cause could be supported by the color red? The red hot equator, of course! As a large international company and the world’s biggest bank HSBC focuses on global issues such as climate control through their HSBC Climate Partnership with organizations such as The Climate Group, Earth Watch, the World Wildlife Fund, and the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute.
I was pleased to learn that HSBC also supports several Children’s Education funds. They founded Future First in 2006, which “provides access to education and teaches life skills to deprived and excluded children.” They also recently launched the HSBC Eco Schools Climate Initiative which aims “to inspire action on climate change by improving schools’ environmental efficiency.”
TD Bank is known as Americas Most Convenient Bank. “Learn what we are doing to help the environment” is posted on their homepage; and it declares that TD Bank is Now Carbon Neutral. Their webpage discusses how TD Bank will save energy and how they will help their clients save energy.
The Canadian equivalent of this initiative is TD’s Friends of the Environment Fund. They actively solicit their clients for donations. On both the American and Canadian sites the homepage is smothered in green leaves and flowers. TD Bank’s brand colour is also coincidently green. Branding opportunity or honestly a good effort?
(Photo by TwoLadiesandTwoCats)
Kristina Tahnyak
Tahnya is a Certified Financial Planner and former Investment Advisor turned marketing and communications professional She holds a degree from Concordia University, is debt free and currently works in the field of digital marketing.
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