Businesses being Green

Entrepreneur Magazine has a great article in the current issue about being green in business. Poss, founder of Seahorse Power Co. in Needham, Massachusetts, is just one of a growing number of entrepreneurs taking environmental concerns into their own hands rather than leaving the task to lawmakers--and creating or growing entire industries out of a need to enact environmental change. The potential is huge. In fact, the Center for Small Business and the Environment in Washington, DC, identifies green industries--ranging from providing products and services made in an eco-friendly manner to supplying renewable energy--as a multibillion-dollar market. I like the graying of the line that is happening here. Small businesses can bring change because they are flexible. They can change their menus, what they serve out of, the type of paper they use, or their mission from the back office. They do not need to go through several levels of management with proposals and memos. At this point, it is almost expected that businesses will do what they can to produce green products and services. Green marketing veteran Jacquelyn A. Ottman agrees. "A lot of consumers are very conscious of the companies behind the products and will reward businesses that make greener products," says Ottman, founder of New York City-based J. Ottman Consulting. "And in turn, they'll punish the companies that don't." My favorite business featured in this article is Seahorse Power Company who produce the BigBelly. This is a solar powered, cordless trash compacter that is replacement standard trash bins in major cities. This reduces waste volume, keeps collection frequency down, and cuts back on trucks that need to be used to empty each can. It is a bit more expensive up front to use the BigBelly but the long run value very much out weighs this cost. This article ends like this: No doubt, entrepreneurs are the ones enacting change. "The small guys can run rings around the big guys," says Kennard, who helped organize the original Earth Day in 1970. "We didn't have to encourage entrepreneurs to enter the fray, they were already there--entrepreneurs see an environmental problem as a profitable opportunity." Well said. ...be bold Tagged: green, business, entrepreneurship, cafe evoke