11.28.07
Going Green
Individuals, businesses, organizations and cities are going green. Some for the right reasons, some for the short-lived “feel goodness” it stirs. But this green thing is not a trend, it is the start of something a lot bigger.
I typed in “going green” in Google News and got more than 55,000 stories (within the past 30 days!) with that exact phrase. At Technorati, more than 7,000 blog posts included “going green” in the past month. Typing it into Google retrieves more than one million results. There are a million search terms you could use to identify conversations taking place online about the green movement and these search results may not all be relevant, but clearly people are talking!
I started implementing steps to “green” my lifestyle lately, and hope to continue. Through my research, I have found great companies doing great eco-friendly things including:
- Patagonia - the outdoor apparel retailer – striving to protect the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, creating a national outdoor park in Patagonia, Chile, and launching a garment recycling program;
- Whole Foods Market – natural and organic foods retailer – started as an environmentally conscious company, continually striving to reduce, reuse, recycle in the building, operations, energy sources and products they sell; and
- Seventh Generation – a company that makes household products – actually began as an environmental organization before expanding a small eco-friendly product line into a business built around individual and corporate responsibility.
Those are just a few of the big ones. I don’t know of any controversy surrounding their efforts, but regardless I am all for supporting companies that are seriously trying to lessen their impact.
Corporations taking a larger step include Google, McDonald’s, Coca-Cola, and Wal-Mart. I can’t imagine how looming it must seem for the public relations pro’s behind those campaigns and initiatives. There is so much that goes into a business – from production, packaging, disposing, transporting, operating – it goes on and on. But for an international company… wow.
My employer is striving to be more green internally and for our clients. Reducing paper waste, recycling and drinking tap water out of Thermos’ are all small steps we’re taking that will hopefully lead to bigger ones.
More to come about great green campaigns, and the ones that are just for show. Just wanted to get the green ball rolling…