Green Options

I had the pleasure of being the guest on a (the?) twitter #SmallBizChat last night.  The brain child of up and coming small biz powerhouse Melinda Emerson (a.k.a. @smallbizlady), #SmallBizChat happens every Wednesday night from 8-9PM EST.  Melinda, along with her co-host Cathy Larkin (@CathyWebSavvyPR) run a great event that is worth checking into as a listener/participant but also as a guest.  The whole evening is topped off with a PDF transcript of the event made available within in minutes courtesy of Sonia Schenker (@yourjobmyoffice).

Last night’s topic was, obviously, greening your small business.  I had prepared a dozen questions and answers and was expecting to field additional questions. But what happened, and here’s the beauty of Twitter and why this kind of event is Twitter at its best, is that a real dialogue occurred.  I didn’t have much chance to interject, mostly because several people had perfectly good answers that came from their day to day operations. For example, when question #2 was posted:

I, as planned, posted my 140 character response:

Its a perfectly fine answer, but the chat took off and many other terrific “definitions” kept popping up.

A group of the Web’s leading environmental blogs, podcasts, and social media outposts today announced that they have combined to form a single environmental publishing and social media powerhouse. The resulting new entity, Simple Earth Media, includes top environmental media and publishing entities such as Green Living Ideas, Blue Living Ideas, Twilight Earth, GreenTalk Radio, EcoTech Daily and Natural Papa.

The brainchild of co-founders Sean Daily, CEO, and my friend Adam Shake, Editor-In-Chief and founder of Twilight Earth, Simple Earth Media is a new media and social media company whose brand mission is to create a compelling, organic, educational network of environmental online venues that engage an ever-growing audience concerned with sustainable lifestyle habits and business practices.

“Bringing the Green Living Ideas and Twilight Earth site networks together was a natural fit all around,” said Sean Daily, Simple Earth Media’s CEO and President. Daily continued, “Adam and I share a very similar outlook and perspective, not only on the type of editorial content that is necessary and relevant for the future of humanity and the planet, but also in regards to the types of companies we want to work with as sponsors and advertisers supporting our network. We are also really fortunate to have a combined staff of the best writers in the business.”

This review is part of the Green Books campaign. Today 100 bloggers are reviewing 100 great books printed in an environmentally friendly way. Our goal is to encourage publishers to get greener and readers to take the environment into consideration when purchasing books. This campaign is organized by Eco-Libris, a green company working to green up the book industry by promoting the adoption of green practices, balancing out books by planting trees, and supporting green books. A full list of participating blogs and links to their reviews is available on Eco-Libris website.
Are you hungry for solutions that will relieve you from the guilt and challenge of living a stylish yet environmentally conscious life? Then The Lazy Environmentalist on a Budget by cable TV personality Josh Dorfman (aka, The Lazy Environmentalist) by Stewart Tabori & Chang is a must-read. Realizing that the road to hell is paved with good intentions, Dorfman has written a terrific book with the overarching goal of helping us all make a positive impact on our world without having to compromise too much.
And contrary to what many people think, Dorfman explains how it can be affordable and easy to lead a greener life.  In fact, The Lazy Environmentalist on a Budget provides readers with solutions that don’t require much effort or financial commitment, but yield significant green payback. He covers everything from ways to reduce/reuse/recycle and conserve energy and water, to less obvious practices like greening your transport, eco-remodeling and finding non-toxic cleaning supplies. The resources include everything from denim repair to ways to borrow stuff from your neighbors to which stores have the best deals on affordable eco-furnishings, sustainable beauty products and budget-friendly organic cotton baby goods.

Someone recently asked me if there was a public health angle to greening small businesses.  After thinking it over, it became clear there is.  First, when we talk about green we are also talking about issues of safety and health: Materials should foster healthy environments, current and future. This means avoiding toxic and dangerous chemicals. It means using an appropriate ventilation system. It means projects should be well-built to minimize safety risks to the occupants (fire, collapse, etc.). It also means making larger ties between the products we buy and energy security, homeland and foreign security, and other “issues of the day.”

Please keep in mind that there are 27 million small businesses in the US and consider these facts from the SBA: Small businesses…

Employ just over half of U.S. workers. Of 119.9 million non-farm private sector workers in 2006, small firms with fewer than 500 workers employed 60.2 million and large firms employed 59.7 million.
Represent 99.7 percent of all employer firms.

I see three distinct public health implications:

Public Health Implication #1: I have a case study in my new book that talks about greening that is recognized by the EPA and OSHA as exemplary and that points out that quality, environmental, health, and safety standards are all intertwined; a company that set and meets the highest health and safety standards is the surest route to profitability and competitiveness. The Ideal Jacobs Corporation, a commercial printing company in NJ, has been recognized by both the EPA and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) for environmental and social responsibility. One of a few, small independent manufacturers in the EPA’s Performance Track program—a program for companies with the best environmental management systems in the country.

Says Andrew Jacobs, President: “You can’t get the best profits, you can’t even compete worldwide unless you are the ultimate in making as little garbage as possible, having the least amount of it around so your people won’t get sick, and being one of the safest you can be. So by being the best employer, you’re also being the most profitable.”

Jacobs chose to focus on two high-impact areas of his business: solid waste and hazardous waste.

“After working through the EPA application [twice], I realized the correlation between reducing solid waste and higher profit margins. It suddenly dawned on me: Of course, create less pollution and [you’ll] have more end-product…We invited in OSHA, which was unheard of at the time. Then, I realized that the healthier and safer our place was, the more money I was making. Every click we made in terms of quality, environmentalism, and safety, every time we notched up, we made more money.”

Since 2002, the company has reduced its solid waste per dollar of sales by more than 50%. By substituting less toxic materials in its sheet-fed printing operations, the company achieved an 18% reduction in pounds of solid waste per $1 in sales and a 23% reduction in pounds of hazardous materials used per $1 in sales. Ideal Jacobs is proof that good sustainability practices are good for business.

On November 5th and 9th a gathering of great CSR minds is happening virtually. And while there are many interesting forums and conferences happening every day, this global summit is somewhat unique because its coming to a PC near you.
I’m especially happy its happening virtually because my favorite CEO, Jeff Schwartz of Timberland, is giving the keynote. If you, like me are out of town, you do not to have to miss it.
It makes sense that a summit on new models of social responsibility should take place making use of a new model of communications. And the event is environmentally friendly as well. By utilizing web conferencing technology, the live summit’s carbon footprint is minimized (because large events can have significant environmental impacts).  According to the organizers:

This is a ground-breaking summit that is using the latest communications technology to reach everyone who can help add to the knowledge necessary to to make social responsibility the way all organizations conduct business.

The summit has all the makings of a must-attend event:

All this talk about going green, do we really know what exactly it means?  Companies invest millions in trying to segment the green market. There’s the BBMG Conscious Consumer Report.  The Roper Green Gauge. The Landor ImagePower Green Brands Survey.  And on and on..(..so many segments, so little time!) Maybe more importantly: When we talk about green are we talking about the same thing?  Apparently not.

This week I spoke with Jamie Wimberly whose firm, EcoAlign, just came out with a report called “Green Gap Redux: Green Words Gone Wrong”. Wimberly is CEO of Distributed Energy Financial Group (DEFG), a company in the clean tech space that includes EcoAlign. Jamie has nearly 20 years of experience in the energy and environment space, previously having served as the Vice President of the Consumer Energy Council of America (CECA), the President of the Center for the Advancement of Energy Markets (CAEM) and a Director on Boards of technology companies. He is a published author, frequent speaker and the Executive Producer of the award-winning Day In The Life Of (DILO) video.

Q: Hi Jamie.  Before we talk about the “Green Gap Redux” report, can you talk about how your focus on energy makes EcoAlign different from other green marketing agencies?
A. I was attracted to the energy sector because it impacts so many of the big issues of our day, including the environment, and is integral to modern society in all aspects.  The relationship between energy and environment is a symbiotic one, meaning that we won’t be able to clean up our environment and manage climate change without a transformation on how we produce, deliver and consume energy.  Our deep expertise in energy (the partners alone have over 50 years of collective experience in the sector) means that we can go beyond your usual agency engagement and truly discuss all aspects of strategy – operational, financial, marketing, etc.  As such, we are able to elevate the discussion of such things as messaging/ communications, product development, customer engagement, campaign design, channels and metrics, and other marketing-related activities to the C-level suite of our clients.  Finally, I would note that “sustainability” is evolving into a complete management model.  For that transition to be effective, you need to have a lot of skill sets and a strategic perspective that only comes from a deep understanding of all the moving pieces of a company. The end goal is for sustainability to become a business and economic driver to enhance profitably.

If you are thinking about ways to green your supply chain, you’re not alone. A Supply Chain Consortium survey showed that organizations of all sizes are implementing sustainability initiatives throughout the supply chain not only to achieve regulatory compliance, but also to improve brand image and customer satisfaction.

What does that mean? The most effective greening of purchasing involves thinking about your entire inbound supply chain with an overriding purpose in mind: to select and purchase goods and services that are affordable, and have the least possible environmental impact throughout the course of every phase of their lifecycle including manufacturing, shipping/transportation, use, and recycling or disposal. And, contrary to popular belief, green purchasing does not always have to mean higher costs—although sometimes it will. In fact, by greening your supply chain you can often streamline your purchasing process, reduce overall costs, and improve your environmental footprint.

There are five good supply chain strategies that can be used to reduce waste. You can start by considering strategies that reduce the physical distance between where materials are sourced and where they are used. These strategies not only help reduce travel-related emissions, but also often result in shorter times to market and lower inventory holding costs:

Buying local is an excellent greening strategy. There significant social, environmental, and economic benefits to creating local economies. At this writing, some thirty-six cities and towns—from Albuquerque to Tampa—have adopted programs to label and promote locally owned businesses. It is always worthwhile to check with your vendors about the availability of local products and materials. Buying local also provides business owners with more control over their materials and end products. As an example, one wholesale distributor of locally grown food products in Michigan tells the story of being able to deliver poultry products that are cut to customer specifications quickly and on a regular basis, something that would be impossible if he were using larger, more distant vendors. The Business Alliance for Local Living Economies (BALLE) is a good resource for finding a local business network in your area.

Walking the green walk, isn’t always easy, and the holidays present special challenges. Its not always easy to mess with traditions. Last Thanksgiving I hosted a 100-mile Thanksgiving (I chronicled it in two blog posts on the OrganicMania blog). My attempt to convince my mother-in-law in Tampa that buying condensed milk at my local supermarket for her traditional key lime pie wasn’t really in the spirit of the plan, did not go over so well. That said, I can see a 100-mile Christmas, Chanukah, Kwanza or even a 100-mile gift rule.

Tip #1: Source locally. Use local and sustainable produce, flowers, beverages, décor and rentals for holiday parties and meals.

Beyond that, there are two primary categories of activities involved in greening holiday parties and events: Finding ways to minimize the impact of the consumption occurring at the event itself, including food, flowers, beverages, décor, gifts, ect… Finding ways to mitigate the carbon footprint resulting from the airplane travel, car travel and lodging consumed for the event.

The good news is that there are a number of greening strategies that can deal with some or all of these factors that that are sexy and require little to no extra costs.

Make sure you have a recycling plan in place. Make recycling easy by having a sufficient number of well-marked recycling bins near where people need them.
If you are exchanging gifts (…think Secret Santa), make them green. There are a host of environmentally friendly gifts items ranging from aluminum water bottles to solar powered messenger bags to fair trade chocolates to locally made crafts that could fit the bill.

Yet again, a LinkedIn question (asking for top 10 greening tips) got me thinking.  Is there really a thing such as a generic list of top 10 tips for greening? I don’t think so.

As a start, the foundation of a green program lies in what a business is already doing. Do you recycle? Do you use CFLs? Do you have a programmable thermostats? Do you leave their PCs on all night? How much water do you use? What are your transportation needs? Depending on the answers to these and other questions, you will be able to identify the areas where the top green opportunities lie.  Even if you business practices are not very green now, you will probably find that you’ve adopted a green business practices already, and that you can implement others with no cost or change in business performance.  As an example, for most small businesses, changing to high efficiency lights or using recycled copy paper will have no direct impact on your core business operations.
So how do you know what the top 10 things you can be doing to green yourself are? One way to determine which greening practices will yield the most bang for the buck (a.k.a. be a top 10 tip) is to focus on the largest expense areas. There is often a correlation between expenses and volume of use. If you cut back on what you spend, you will likely reduce what you use.
So, whether reducing paper use or switching to high efficiency lights is a top 10 tip depends, well, on how much paper and electricity you’re using.  A business may want to target all expense areas over a certain threshold amount. You can measure this in dollars or as a percentage of overall expenses, such as any expense on which you spend over $500 a month, or that represent 10% or more of total expenses. A list of business expenses can guide the planning process. Start with the areas of the business that will have the greatest financial impact. You may not be able to change things as dramatically as you’d like, especially at first. Look for actions that are achievable and cost effective to implement. If staff leave lights on in unoccupied rooms (bathrooms, storage sheds), you may want to make turning off the lights in unused areas a priority. That step may be as simple as posting signs on light switches. If, on the other hand the lights are generating significant added costs, they may want to install motion sensors or bi-level light switches.

The FedEx logo has a hidden message. Does it matter?
In a blog post called “25 logos with hidden messages – Amazing Graphic Designing tricks!” Charlie Johnson, the author, talks about what makes a logo a good marketing tool. He says:

…make your logo look more conceptual and clever using the graphic designing tricks. As it is said, a logo should not be a plain looking symbol…it should reflect you and your company’s personality.