-By Kenneth Hein

It’s getting harder to find a brand that doesn’t claim to be green. But, do they have a solar power factory? Is the rest of their energy use offset by energy credits? And, are they rebuilding a town that was virtually wiped out by a tornado? Not likely.

Sun Chips is different. The Frito-Lay product has rooted its brand in environmental causes as well as health-forward thinking. This strategy has paid off handsomely as Sun Chip sales are up 17.6%, totaling $201.8 million for the 52 weeks ending June 15, per IRI.

A recent Earth Day ad proudly proclaimed “We are living up to our name” as it recently added solar energy to its plant in Modesto, Calif. Whatever energy that isn’t used to produce its 145,000 bags of whole grain chips a day is offset by energy credits under a companywide program instituted by parent company PepsiCo.

Consumers are responding to the messaging as well as the product which boasts 18 grams of whole grain, low sodium and no trans-fat. To keep the heat rising for the brand, Sun Chips’ media spend the first four months was boosted to $15 million. This already eclipsed last year's total of $11 million (not including online), per Nielsen Monitor-Plus. Juniper Park, Toronto, is Sun Chips' agency.

Frito-Lay vp-marketing Gannon Jones talked to Brandweek news editor Kenneth Hein about why really being green is healthy for sales.

Brandweek: Sun Chips sales are hot. How’d you do it?
Gannon Jones: Sun Chips is becoming one of, if not, the fastest growing snack brand in our company and the snack industry. It is well aligned with health trends. Consumers want to make small steps in eating a little better. They view Suns Chips as a small step . . . We were looking at how to maintain the growth of the business. It was late 2006 when like everybody else was starting to become concerned about the planet and environment. Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth came out. We started to see that there was an intersection of people who were concerned with their health and the planet’s health. Out of that was born the hypothesis that we could begin to connect Sun Chips more prominently with the environment so [the brand would become] a small step for me and the planet.

BW: What steps has Sun Chips taken to better the planet?
GJ: Installing solar panels at our plant. [We thought] there is a huge opportunity there with Sun Chips being made from sun. [We opened the plant and announced it] around Earth Day. The steam used to make the chips is generated through a solar field installed at Modesto. PepsiCo [also] purchased green energy credits to offset our energy usage. We were the first major brand to talk about that on out packaging. One thing also learned about green brands and believe very much is that the brands that are most successful in speaking about green make it core to their business strategy. It's not something you can treat as a consumer promotion and do it for three months and move to the next promotion. Like Prius and Stonyfield Farms who make it core to brand operations, that's something we believed in. We needed to take a series of steps. There are the energy credits, the plant in Modesto and most recently we got involved with the town of Greensburg, Kan. It was brought to our attention by our media agency that Discovery and Leonardo DiCaprio were putting together a series chronicling the rebuilding of this town. We jumped on board. It is at the intersection of right for the brand and right thing to do. It’s such a logical right thing to do.

On May 4 of last year the highest scale of tornado hit a town of 1,500 people. It destroyed 95% of the town. What we're doing to help rebuild the town is we made a $1 million donation for the building that will house 15-20 small businesses. They had a funding gap for that building. Greensburg is being built in an eco-friendly way and is being envisioned to be a model of sustainability for the U.S. and the world. The more we got involved, the more we learned. Two of our sales reps homes destroyed. People who literally drive the trucks on the roads. It became a tremendous human-interest story. Everyone in the organization is especially proud of it. One of our sales reps is being chronicled in the series. We have 50 to 100 members of sales force going there this summer to rebuild the town. We partnered with Discover to put together an online campaign encouraging Americans to help rebuild Greensburg. It went live July 14 at Planetgreen.com/sunchips. A Facebook application and online support encouraging them to pant a tree in Greensburg [also launched]. It was a green canopy town. It had the designation of having a lot of trees. There are no trees left.

BW: Do you get placement in the series?
GJ: The series launched in mid-June and has 13 episodes. It will run through the end of September. It’s on Discovery and Planet Green. Sun Chips has a very big presence in the show. It's not about gratuitous packaging placement. It's about us talking about why it makes why for us to be involved considering our green commitment.

BW: How do your ads talk about your green efforts?
GJ: Our mass-market talks about Modesto. It started in April. It is predominantly TV and print. There is some online. There is also some statement media like billboards powered by the sun’s shadows. On Earth Day, we did the first solar powered newspaper ad. You hold it up to the sun to read the copy. [Ads] will continue throughout the balance of the year. We are determined to find more ways to talk small steps from a green standpoint. We’ll continue our solar message in 2009. A true green brand makes it a part of their business strategy. We're seeing a lot of customers and retailers interested in these efforts. This resonates a lot with them. With Wal-Mart, we had a partnership earlier this year to be one of few brands they are pushing in the environment space along with GE light bulbs and Tide cold water. We’re spending more. Sun Chips is a huge growth engine. It’s so on trend. The biggest challenge we have is penetration because not enough consumers know about us yet.