If you are looking for a way to innovatively market your products and services, TerraCycle is a company worth learning about. The unique way they capitalize on waste has inspired me to view garbage in a whole new light. Their approach to waste has set them apart and I think other companies can benefit from applying a similar outlook toward waste. TerraCycle produces and packages their products entirely from waste and they have become pioneers in the world of eco-capitalism. Their unique story has been written about countless times and you can read all about it here. Padosa recently took a site visit to their Trenton, NJ headquarters. Read the full story

We talk about “going green” a lot at Padosa (it’s our biggest tag, after all) but rarely do we examine exactly how hard that can be to accomplish. Running a sustainable business takes a great deal of resources, cooperative employees, technical know-how, and, well, money. Are you adequately prepared to do what it takes to go green or does the prospect or so much change discourage you? This article takes a look at some of the barriers companies face as they try to go green and offers some resources and advice on how to beat them. Read the full story

In first two parts of this article, I examined Vinidex and the 60L Green Building respectively, two examples of the ways in which Australia is embracing sustainability. In this, the final part, I investigate a collaboration between the local government of Fairfield City and a group of big businesses. Continue reading to find out how two large organizations pooled their resources to save over a million dollars per year. Read the full story

In the first part of this article, I looked at the Australian pipe manufacturer Vinidex. In this portion, part 2 of 3, the focus is on the 60L Green Building in Melbourne. Using a combination of unique utility tactics, the project set a precedent not only for building ventures Down Under, but the world over. Read on to find out how the 60L Building was completed and what environmental and empolyee benefits were gained. Perhaps it will give you some green building ideas of your own. Read the full story

Since Al Gore’s documentary ‘An Inconvenient Truth’ first raised our awareness of climate change, more people around the world are doing their part for the environment and are willing to support immediate action at any cost. A seventeen-nation survey conducted by World Public Opinion.org showed that nearly seven out of ten people in Australia believe action to combat climate change is important to the nation’s vital interests. Thus, Australian businesses are stepping up and following the footsteps of other nations into managing their workplaces to reduce pollution and use fewer resources. They are considering the needs of people and taking the environment into account, as the case study below demonstrates. Read the full story

It’s hard to imagine a world without Starbucks. The coffee giant serves almost six million customers a day or 2,190,000,000 beverages a year. That’s enough to give every American seven grande cappucinos (though I’m sure there are quite a few people who drink about that amount daily). There’s no denying the power and influence Starbucks has over not only the United States, but the whole world. Read the full story

Yesterday I wrote about the importance of environmentalists speaking in the language of business if they wanted to affect business performance. Today’s WSJ has an excellent article in support of this. The article reviews the success of a program at a Subaru manufacturer that embraced green manufacturing 20 years ago. The finding – that the project has provided terrific business results measured primarily through a waste reduction program. Read the full story

(Hint: They are everywhere.)

Arguably as recently as 20 years ago, the so-called “green consumer” fit into a certain demographic that many companies considered a narrow one and not necessarily an economically viable “target” for advertising and marketing dollars. If, however, you are still thinking that today’s “green consumer” is a narrow segment of the population, you are operating in the past, and more importantly, missing out on a very important, very broad market for your products and services. For example, in a recent study commissioned by retailer Plow and Hearth (a subsidiary of 1-800-Flowers.Com Inc.), it was reported that 55% of women and 45%of men intended to purchase green products during the holiday season. (“Holiday Shoppers Plan to Spend More on Green Gifts.” Portland Business Journal. November 24, 2008). Likewise, in a recent report released by Green Seal, an independent nonprofit product certification organization, and EnviroMedia Social Marketing, four out of five people reported that they are still buying “green” today, notwithstanding the current tough economic times. (“Green Purchasing Up, Despite Economy.” Livescience.Com. February 7, 2009.)

In fact, it turns out that some very good, very reputable, and very profitable companies have evolved their business plans to target, or at least to include, today’s green consumer, with the knowledge that today’s green consumer is young and not-so-young , male and female, stay-at-home parent and career professional.

Method: Bringing Green to the Mainstream & Earning Green

Take Method for example. Method was started in 1999 by two young entrepeneurs, Eric Ryan and Adam Lowry. Essentially Ryan and Lowry sought to market household cleaning products that not only appeal to today’s green consumer’s green conscience, but also to his/her aethetics, convenience, and pocketbook. The Method philosophy is that by creating a product that is stylish, consumers will be attracted to the product, and by creating a product that works, consumers will stick with the product once they try it. By creating a product that is effective and looks good (but is environmentally sound in its composition, effect, and packaging), Method seeks to reach a broader audience than other household cleaning product companies.

As a panelist at a 2007 New Yorker Magazine Conference Program entitled: “Solutions 2012: Stories from the Near Future”, Adam Lowry described how his company is all about “bringing green to mainstream.” In fact, Lowry left his work as a climate scientist in the public sector because he felt that his work was only “preaching to the converted” and he was dealing primarily in an area that separated – rather than integrated – ecology and economics. Lowry was certain that it was possible to work in the business sector and still align ecology and economics, and the success of Method has proven his point. In fact, in 2002, Method obtained a distribution deal with Target Corporation, a move that has really led the way for Method to reach mainstream green consumers.

However, unlike the “converted” that Lowry previously targeted in his work as a climate scientist, Lowry acknowledges that today’s mainstream green consumer is not likely to be willing to make sacrifices in order to purchase a green product. Thus, in order to effectively target and include today’s green consumer, Method focuses on “total quality” of which green is certainly a component, as is efficacy and design. Method focuses on creating household cleaning products that work without harsh toxic chemicals, but instead are made with naturally derived, biodegradable ingredients. Their products apparently work by absorbing dirt rather than chemically degrading it. Method also maintains a green corporate philosophy, pledging to reduce “carbon emissions by planting forests and by buying electricity from renewable sources like solar and wind energy”. The packaging is natural too; for example they make recyclable bottles from 100% recycled plastic. [Source: www.methodhome.com]

Method consumers have responded positively to the company and its products, and Method has a name for its most passionate consumers: People Against Dirty. The company provides a forum on their website for People Against Dirty and tries to encourage them to disseminate the corporate message by arming them with company information and samples. It is a grassroots movement of sorts and at the 2007 New Yorker conference, Adam Lowry was quick to credit the success of the company in part upon this movement, noting that it is often more effective than a 30-second commercial.

TerraCycle: Eco-Conscious and Profit-Driven

Another company targeting the mainstream green consumer is a company called TerraCycle. Also the brainchild of young entrepeneurs, TerraCycle was founded in 2001 by two Princeton University students, Tom Szaky and Jon Beyer, who created TerraCycle Plant Food, an all-natural, all-organic, liquid plant food made from worm waste and packaged in reused soda bottles. TerraCycle Plant Food is now sold in Home Depot, reaching a broad audience of consumers, including today’s green consumer.

TerraCycle, like Method , evolved from the founders’ notion that a company could be financially successful while still being ecologically and socially responsible. Like Method, TerraCycle has its own corporate conscience and even grassroots movements, including recycling programs established with various schools that collect bottles for TerraCycle’s packaging, in return for school donations. TerraCycle also has instituted several “Sponsored Waste” programs, whereby corporations pay TerraCycle to collect their waste products (such as candy wrappers, juice and yogurt containers) and “upcycle” them, that is, create a new usable product. Examples are pouches, shower curtains and totebags that TerraCycle sells on its website and in stores such as Wal-Mart and Target.

Method and TerraCycle: Sustainable, Innovative & Successful

As described above, Method and TerraCycle share several main attributes in common, attributes that any small business would be wise to emulate, as these practices have not only made the companies better companies, they have arguably helped them to broaden their customer base and increase sales.

• They both market products that are environmentally friendly.

• They both package the products in recycled and otherwise environmentally friendly packaging.

• Both maintain a corporate conscience as evidenced by their corporate participation in environmental and social programs.

• Lastly, both companies have fostered grassroots movements that both complement their corporate conscience and help to advance their marketing aims.

But the similarities do not end there. Both companies recognize that today’s green consumer will not always make sacrifices to buy green. This means that the price point, aesthetics, and most importantly – quality – cannot be ignored in creating and marketing your “green product.” Put simply, while companies like TerraCycle and Method were founded on the belief that ecology and economics need not be segregated to market to the green consumer; these companies have prospered due to the realization that product quality and the environment need not be segregated – indeed cannot be segregated – to effectively market to today’s green consumer, who is – did I mention? – everywhere.

By Amy K. Impellizzeri

Beer. It does the planet good.

Nearly two decades ago, beverage visionary and Beer School author Steve Hindy made a decision that would help change the way New Yorkers drank beer.
“You want me to do what?” asked Brooklyn Brewery’s first head brewer.

“I want you to brew the best-tasting beer you can, whatever the cost,” replied Hindy, the company’s president and co-founder.

For the brewer, it was an unusual request, one he had never heard before. He came from a tradition of beer-making that had been dominated by large-scale producers — macrobreweries like Anheuser-Busch, Miller and Coors — whose light-tasting, marketing-heavy beers accounted for 19 of every 20 beers sold in the US during the ’80s.

But over the next twenty years, rogue “craft brewers” — Hindy and his upstart Brooklyn Brewery among them — would gain ground by using macrobrewery production as a foil. They insisted the title craft beer be used to differentiate breweries that were small (producing less than 2 million barrels annually), independent and dedicated to using 100 percent taste-centric ingredients.

Today, because of that insistence on quality over quantity, they are the fastest growing segment of the beverage industry. While macrobrewery growth stagnates, craft breweries enjoyed an unparalleled 58 percent increase in sales between 2003 and 2007.

Having achieved a sustainable level of success, they’re taking an opportunity to once again change the way their customers think about beer. No longer bemuddled by finding their niche in the market, Hindy and a few upstart brewers are refocusing their energy on, well, energy itself.

A handful of craft pioneers are reinvesting their profits in green power, and, in doing so, expanding what it means for everyday imbibers to drink responsibly. They’re powering their operations with wind-, solar-, and bio-energy, and finding new ways to recycle and reuse their waste, all despite the fact that it is getting more expensive to do so. Shortages of grains and hops, coupled with increasingly hostile competition from larger conglomerates has put a pinch on their efforts.

On principle, though, they forge on.

“Alternative energies are costly,” Hindy says, “but we think it’s the right thing to do.”

This year, Brooklyn Brewery will produce 80,000 barrels of beer — and they’ll do so having run entirely on 100 percent sustainable wind-power. The energy alternative adds a 10 percent premium to a monthly bill that already hovers around $20,000; but it prevents more than 300,000 pounds of pollution from entering the earth’s atmosphere each year.

When the system was implemented several years ago, Hindy received unexpected praise: some sent letters, others simply bought more beer.

“I guess people feel better about their beer knowing it’s powered by the wind,” he says.

In the face of corporate lip-service announcements, Brooklyn Brewery’s quiet efforts led the way in showing New Yorkers that reducing their carbon footprint wasn’t about walking on USDA-certified organic eggshells. It was about everyday choices, even the ones made in the beer aisles of the local supermarket.

Months earlier, in a distant Williamsburg office, Hindy set the tone for such decisions. After biking to work from his home in Park Slope, he sat down at his desk, considering operational improvements that might be made without reducing the quality of his beer. Some time in the afternoon, he received a call from a local energy advocate informing him of a temporary strain on the grid. After Hindy hung up, he walked to the front of his office and switched off the lights and went on working near his window.

He would go on to review improvements in his distribution network, making concerted effort to distribute within a reasonable radius. Growing regionally is more practical, he says, now that it costs more than $3 to truck each case of beer across the country.

Down the road, Hindy’s staff anticipates working with partner-breweries to spread the Brooklyn taste: crafting, bottling, and distributing Brooklyn-inspired beers on someone else’s home turf.

“I think we’re going to see a lot more breweries collaborating, sharing their processes in the future,” he says.

At home, too, Brooklyn Brewery continues to evolve their brewing process. They are in the midst of searching for a new facility, and the opportunity to start afresh has fueled a host of eco-friendly, energy-efficient ideas. Harnessing solar energy, utilizing natural heat transfer, and capturing chemical reactions are a few of the promising initiatives that would bring the brewery closer to running on its own homegrown power.

“Breweries lend themselves to a lot of eco-friendly processes,” Hindy says. As soon as the battle for a new space is won, they’re ready to tap in.

Photovoltaic solar panels, for one, have the potential to alleviate the largest energy expenditure in a brewery. Constant temperature modulation — roasting grain solutions, boiling and sanitizing the sugary byproducts, then reducing the scalding liquid down to cold, fermentable temperatures in the mid-50s — is akin to Brooklyn Brewery constantly heating and cooling the water held in 150 swimming pools.

According to the New York Public Services Commission, however, solar panels could supply half of that power (one-third of the brewery’s total usage) with an initial price tag of under $500,000. Recouping that cost through energy savings and government rebates would take Brooklyn Brewery less than 20 years, half the solar panel’s lifetime.

Furthermore, if they chose to couple the solar installation with a heat-transfer system, the brewery could make even more efficient use of energy. Pipes running alongside the hot panels could deliver water naturally heated to 140 degrees, well on its way to the requisite boil.

Processes happening within the brewery — many of them chemical — also hold potential to subsidize breweries’ energy needs. Scientists in Australia and Colorado have discovered that the same bacteria used to ferment beer can be used to help fuel the brewery. The process is simple: What we consider waste, the bacteria consider food. By placing them in an oxygen-free microbial cell with the brewery’s waste water instead of in tanks of beer, the bacteria consume undesirable elements in the water, and, in the process, leave behind both chemical energy and partially-treated water. Foster’s Brewery in Australia produces enough energy with this method to power a house for one year.

* * * *

Still, significant hurdles stand between Hindy and his brew-topia. Rising real estate costs in Brooklyn have made the battle for a new brewery nearly impossible, shelving green innovation for the time being.

To make matters worse, precipitate rises in the price of grains and hops (the bittering agent in beer) have increased brewers’ costs an extra dollar for every six pack produced, compared to just 3 years ago. It may not sound like much, but with macrobreweries like Anheuser-Busch and Belgian-owned InBev consolidating to hold more sway in the grains and international markets, craft breweries know something has to give.

Reducing quality has never been an option for Brooklyn Brewery. The use of adjuncts, additive grains like corn and rice favored by larger breweries, would dilute their taste and violate the goal of brewing the best beer regardless of cost.

“You can’t compromise those kinds of principles without sacrificing your business,” Hindy says. As for their green initiatives, he believes “they may be costly in the short run, but in the long run they will be worthwhile.”

Warily, Hindy announced this past February that Brooklyn Brewery would be increasing the price of their products by six percent, across the board.

Since the price increase, Brooklyn Brewery’s sales have held steady, growing by double-digit percentages in each of the past six months. As of December 2008, no progress has been made in acquiring a new facility.

By Ashwin Sodhi

Ashwin Sodhi is a freelance writer and new media journalist living in New York City. He specializes in the creation and syndication of interactive content, and has been featured on several prominent blogs and online magazines. Ashwin can be contacted at ashwinsodhi@yahoo.com.