Green Options

For the past two years, founder Monica Ralli of UrthBags in California, developed strategies to inspire people. Her goal was to create a stronger sense of eco-consciousness on our overly-disposable planet.

Monica also planned how to stimulate the job market. She intended to provide work that would benefit local craftsmen and women’s organizations worldwide. Simultaneously, waste would be reduced significantly.

The handbag materials are milk cartons, juice boxes, telephone books, and newspapers. The craftspeople are artisans from across the globe. Designers are both staffed and sourced.

Voltaic Systems is offering four bags in 2009. Voltaic bag are really mobile solar power generators designed to charge virtually all hand held electronics. They are a great item for ecopreneurists working in remote locations or with businesses needing to work remotely.

This is a guest post by John Simonetta, owner of Proforma Simonetta Freelance, an eco-friendly promotional items consultancy (see proformagreen.com). John’s blogs are designed to keep us up to date on the “greening” of his industry.

Bag Makers, Inc. has come out swinging in the nonwoven tote category with their new Big Thunder nonwoven tote bags. These bags are made from #5 plastic and like other nonwovens can be recycled wherever #5 plastics are accepted.

The Big Thunder’s claim to [...]

Well we often get questions about the source of this cotton and other organic cotton used in our industry so we decided to ask Gemline for some answers. Clif Jordan the Regional Manager (South West) for Gemline was nice enough to send some answers.

Gemline, one of our favorite manufacturers for the style and quality of their green line of promotional items, is starting 2009 strong with the introduction of a number of new, green products.

For 2009 Hit Promotional Products has come out with a Nonwoven Insulated shopper tote bag that their website claims is recyclable, reusable and hand washable.

This is a guest post by John Simonetta, owner of an eco-friendly promotional items consultancy (see proformagreen.com). John’s blogs are designed to keep us up to date on the “greening” of his industry.

Debco now offers a number of lunchtime totes made from at least 25% recycled content. These bags demonstrate the growing trend to make practical, green items available to marketers.

And with the slowing economy I would remind Ecopreneurists that there is likely a much wider audience for these bags as more and more folks are bringing lunch to the office both for economic (it is cheaper than eating out) and health (bringing in healthy foods and avoiding fast foods) reasons.

Simple non woven insulated lunch coolers like the Debco Bag #NW4517 are EQP $3.04 with a one color imprint. The Debco Bag #NW6915 (a square shape designed) are EQP $3.42.  Available in black, red, lime green and royal blue, the bag we seem to be having the most success with is the Debco Bag #NW4694 non woven 100 gram polypropylene insulated cooler pictured to the right. All these bags are made from 25% recycled material, and Debco lists them as biodegradable on the Debco website.

This is a guest post by John Simonetta, owner of an eco-friendly promotional items consultancy (see proformagreen.com). John’s blogs are designed to keep us up to date on the “greening” of his industry.

Debco is now producing color versions of the econo natural 4oz shopping tote. The colors available are black, red, green, lime green, navy, and pink.

The econo tote is very popular with Econpreneurist as the price of these units -$2.11- for the natural color tote places them in range of the popular non-woven shopping bags that are becoming ubiquitous in grocery stores.

Why the popularity? Because organic cotton - any cotton - is biodegradable while most non-woven poly bags are not.

So this post was going to be about me being so excited that Debco is now offering their econo natural 4oz shopping tote in colors, wonderful colors.

According to Debco their overseas supplier uses Azo free dyes on all their bags color bags.  This dye is supposedly eco-friendly and non-hazardous, but they have not conducted any lab tests to confirm this 100%.  However Debco has volunteered to have it done for any client that requests it.

But that is not what I am going to write about.

Apparently - and I don’t know if it is because these guys are based in Canada - Debco is making a distinction between bags made from 100% natural cotton and their organic cotton bags. A distinction I have not seen before.

A couple of weeks ago we had the fortune of having the Green Festival in our Nations Capitol. A large green expo, featuring ways to green every aspect of your life, included big name speakers in the environmental movement.

My favorite part of the weekend? Tucked into a corner was Good Will Industries and D.C.’s own Goodwill Fashionista. For those of you who arn’t familiar with the Fasionista, she writes about how you can find amazing fashion right at your local Good Will shop. Finding gently used clothing and reusing is a concept that is nothing new to readers of this here blog.

What was even more great about the D.C. Fashionista being there, was she was teaching everyone how to make a market tote out of a t-shirt. Genius I say! T-shirts are definitely something Good Will always has in spades.

This is a guest post by John Simonetta, owner of ProformaGreen, an eco-friendly promotional items consultancy. John’s blogs are designed to keep us up to date on the “greening” of his industry.

At the end of September Debco bag introduced the E4827 10oz Organic Cotton Shopper to round out their other offerings in this area of the 6oz and Econo 4oz Organic Cotton Shopping bags. It is good timing considering the end of the year Fall festiva

In the past, when you’ve thought about helping the environment, things like recycling, using rechargeable batteries, cutting back on your power and water usage, and carpooling or bicycling to reduce pollution probably leapt to mind. 

I doubt that carrying a chic, designer bag topped your list. 

But with all of the eco-minded designers popping up, using alternative materials to craft high-end, contemporary creations worthy of a runway romp, you can do your part to save the planet, and look stylish doing it.

Here is a list of the must-have sleek and sustainable haute couture handbags available for the eco-savvy shopper: