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What is Your Eco Score?
Posted by Lior Weinstein on Thursday, March 28th, 2013
More consumers are seeking out sustainable businesses. When entrepreneurs see a need, they step in to fill that void. There are a number of organizations that provide a forum for customers to rate a business on their eco score or carbon footprint. Get your company noticed and go green.
The future of business is green. Those of us who are baby boomers realize that the negligence of our generation and our parent’s generation has led to an environmental crisis, and that we need to do something. Younger generations, or what some people are calling Generation Y or Millennials are already on board with saving the environment. Twenty years ago, it was rare to see an organic food section in a grocery store, or products being promoted as free trade, organic.
The people with the most purchasing power drive the economy, and you can’t ignore the fact that many educated and savvy consumers are looking for green products and services.
Online websites like Ecoscores and Climate Counts score companies on their eco-friendly practices. If you want to attract more customers to your business, you need to start thinking green. A great eco score is free advertising.
If your business is operating on outdated policies and procedures that are more likely to attract protesters than customers, it’s time to make a change.
Start now to transition to a paperless office, or as close as you can get to paperless. There are many ways to accomplish this, but the main one is easy – just stop using as much paper. Digitize your documents by scanning them and storing your documents in the cloud. Use software such as a PDF to Excel converter that gives you a number of options for transferring information directly from PDFs or other formats to spreadsheets. This reduces paper because you don’t have to print out and manually transfer data. Stop printing unnecessary paper. There always seems to someone in every office who prints out everything, whether they need it or not. Faxing is another source of wasted paper. Email is faster and more secure.
Set a goal for zero waste. That means buying products for your business that use less packaging. If you run a business or sell a product that uses a lot of packaging, think of the savings to your company if you change out that blister pack for a recycled paper bag or box. Innovative companies such as candle maker EkoMiko are packaging their product in cardboard boxes embedded with wildflower seeds that can be planted in your garden. This is a company that does what you should be doing, promoting green practices and other green businesses on their blog.
Become an advocate for environmental sustainability. Speak out, or bring awareness to issues in your neighborhood, or on a national or global level.
Maybe you aren’t an environmentalist. Maybe you are one of those business owners who genuinely doesn’t give a flying Ivory-billed Woodpecker (critically endangered and possibly extinct) about the environment. If that is the case, don’t think of this as a wake up call, think of it as a way to make money through consumer engagement. Once you start on this more enlightened path, who knows what will happen. You may learn that making a difference is a fulfilling experience.