A VIEW OF THE C: 7 Corporations You'll Want to Avoid

I've got a sneak preview for you. I want to share a great new online tool that we're officially launching to the public in July. And I want to ask you to help us get it ready for the big launch.

I'm talking about our new Responsible Shopper Web site, of course. It's like the flip-side to our popular GreenPages.org. While the Green Pages help you find the best companies to reward with your business, our ResponsibleShopper.org Web site helps you avoid the worst.

We comb through reports from the news media, the government (from the EPA to the FDA), and our environmental and social justice nonprofit allies to compile comprehensive data on some of the largest corporations in America. Then, we put it together in our easily searchable Web site, so you can make informed purchasing decisions on everything from cosmetics to groceries to clothing and much more.

Through Responsible Shopper's “Go Green” feature, we also link you to strategies for shifting your purchasing and investing to more responsible options.

Below, we tell you about some of the latest transgressions to be perpetrated by corporate America. See how many you've heard about already, and then click through to Responsible Shopper to find the answers to the others.

Also, here's how you can help us get it ready for the big launch this July. We'll be blasting it out to the media, holding a special press teleconference to show the media how it works, and getting it posted all over the Internet. Before we do this, please help us:

1. Make sure it's totally ready. This is a big site with tons of information – and lots of ways to link to it. Check it out; click through the links. Let us know if any aren't working, or if you have any suggestions. Just hit “contact us” when you are on the Responsible Shopper site to let us know what you find! (And tell us how you like the site too.)

2. Build some buzz. Help us make this smart-shopping tool available to everyone and spread the word today by blogging about Responsible Shopper or posting a link on your Web site. If you do, please tell us about it, and we'll include you in an upcoming Responsible Shopper blogroll. Thanks so much, and please take advantage of our site each and every time you're questioning where to spend your dollars so that they make a (positive) difference in the world.

Here's to voting with your dollars for people and the planet‚
Alisa (signature)
Alisa Gravitz, Executive Director, Co-op America

1. Which major retailer saw its New Dehli factories raided in October 2007 by authorities acting on a tip from an undercover newspaper reporter who found children as young as 10 sewing garments for a children's apparel line?

2. Which fast food company (owner of KFC and Taco Bell) received the dismally low score of 1 out of 100 in the "Climate Counts Company Scorecard," a report that that judged companies on their commitment to reversing climate change?

3. Which popular retailer of apparel and toys got busted for the ninth time by Students and Scholars against Corporate Misbehavior (SACOM), which uncovered sweatshop abuses (unpaid wages, illegal working hours, unsafe working conditions) at a producer factor in China in 2007?

4. Which electronics company was revealed in November 2007 to be at least partly responsible for more than 100 current or former Superfund sites? (Superfund sites are locations designated by the Environmental Protection Agency as being so contaminated by toxic chemicals that they are dangerous to human health.)

5. Which chocolate-maker, long under fire by social justice advocates concerned about rampant child labor in the cocoa industry, has also become a dominating force in the bottled water industry, generating tons of plastic-bottle waste, and drawing criticism for polluting groundwater near its bottling facilities?

6. Which popular catalog company was the subject of a 2006 National Labor Committee report documenting abuses at its Saidan factory in Jordan including: human trafficking of guest workers, confiscation of passports, 118-hour work weeks, wages below the legal minimum, no sick days, and unsanitary working conditions?

7. Which chemical company was named the number one polluter in America by a May 2008 report from the Political Economy Research Institute called the “Toxic 100 index”? (The index is based on EPA Toxics Release Inventory data, and ranks the nation's largest companies based on the quantity of their emissions, relative toxicity of chemicals emitted, and proximity to population centers, among other criteria.)

If you have a blog or a personal Web site, post or link to Co-op America's new Responsible Shopper Web site and help us spread the word. E-mail us to let us know you've linked to our site‚ and we'll link back to you in an upcoming blogroll.

Support our work to build a greener economy by donating to our Responsible Shopper program. Help us build a greener future for by holding corporate criminals accountable.

Donate today »

Visit Responsible Shopper today.

Not yet a supporting member? Join today to receive your very own copy of the National Green Pages™ (chock full of the green alternatives to the corporations profiled on Responsible Shopper). Membership is only $20 and includes a subscription to our bi-monthly green-living newsletter Real Money, our Co-op America Quarterly magazine, and a copy of our Guide to Socially Responsible Investing. Your membership provides valuable support for our economic action programs for people and the planet.