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A leading advertising agency is facing employment tribunal claims that it harassed a senior staff member after she warned that its campaigns could “greenwash” the confectionery and pet food group Mars.
AMV BBDO is accused of subjecting Polina Zabrodskaya to “detrimental treatment” after she objected to ad campaigns for Galaxy chocolate and Sheba pet food, according to the filings seen by the Financial Times.
One Mars television campaign that was broadcast carried the slogan “making chocolate better”, without reference to the environmental and labour challenges for farming communities in West Africa. Other campaign materials stated its commitment to “sustainably sourced fish”, even though not all of the fish had obtained a sustainability certification.
The agency, a UK subsidiary of the New-York based Omnicom group, said it would “refute” the “various claims” made by Zabrodskaya. It added that it would not be “appropriate” for it to comment on ongoing employment tribunal proceedings.
Mars declined to comment on what it said was “an internal employment dispute” at the ad agency. But it said it was committed to making its business “more sustainable”, including through “billions of dollars” of investment.
“Our advertising aligns with existing laws, local codes, and our own internal sustainability standards which are guided by the latest available science,” it added.
Advertising and communications groups have been grappling with a more activist stance by staff on environmental and social issues in recent years. The Clean Creatives professional campaign group says it has enlisted more than 1,000 agencies in a pledge not to work with fossil fuel clients.
At the same time, watchdogs, including the UK’s Advertising Standards Authority, have cracked down on green claims in advertising made by an array of companies, including energy, consumer and airline groups.
A TV ad for Mars’ Galaxy chocolate that eventually ran with the slogan “making chocolate better, one piece at a time” was a key point of disagreement between Zabrodskaya and agency executives, her claim says.
Zabrodskaya raised in conversations and messages with colleagues and Mars executives the warnings from research scientists, campaign groups or government organisations that child labour, deforestation or low pay were prevalent in West Africa, a region where Mars sourced some of its cocoa. A more senior agency staff member reprimanded her for this, before excluding her from some client meetings, she says in the tribunal claim.
References to Mars’ involvement in “sustainable cocoa farming and community programmes”, which Polina objected to in the draft television ad, did not appear in the final version, a person close to Mars said.
Mars says it aims to achieve a deforestation-free supply chain this year and invests in income support and research programmes to support farmers and prevent child labour in its supply chain.
The following year, after a promotion, Zabrodskaya began working on Mars’ Sheba cat food brand. She said she did not believe the company could substantiate its claim to be committed to “100% sustainably sourced fish”, according to the tribunal claim, including over dinner with a senior Mars executive responsible for the product in November 2023.
Mars says that 83 per cent of its Sheba fish recipes in Europe are sustainably sourced.
Following the dinner with the Mars executive, Zabrodskaya was suspended, according to a report prepared in December 2023 by an AMV BBDO managing partner as part of an internal inquiry.
The requests to design campaigns that she felt created “an illusion of sustainability” for Mars went against her “deep philosophical belief in the moral obligation of environmental stewardship and ethical communications”, her claim says.
After Zabrodskaya made a complaint about her treatment, two external HR consultants were engaged by AMV BBDO.
Both reports said they had not found evidence that the ad agency had retaliated or discriminated against Zabrodskaya based on her beliefs.
AMV BBDO’s latest sustainability report highlights that it is part of Ad Net Zero, an industry group that calls on members to “promote more sustainable choices” by consumers.
Zabrodskaya’s initial claim for discrimination and harassment, filed shortly before she left the agency last April, relates to beliefs protected under the Equality Act as well as unlawful detriment as a result of making “protected disclosures”, which would apply to a whistleblower. A separate constructive dismissal claim was filed in July.
She is seeking damages and compensation for harms, including emotional distress, which she claims to have suffered while at AMV BBDO, which she left after more than five years. A case management hearing for both claims is scheduled at the London South Employment Tribunal in April.
Equality legislation in the UK provides protection for a belief in climate change. But protections for acting on that belief have yet to be fully tested, Zabrodskaya’s legal team believes. The backers for the cases include Law for Change, which funds cases it considers to be in the public interest.
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