Green Businesses
Today I tip my hat to the business that I believe have actually made a step in the right direction in terms of being more environmentally friendly. There are, of course, numerous companies that claim to have greened their operations but really have just wasted a lot of money on their marketing department. They are not helping. Also not helping are the companies that offer environmentally friendly products at an unreasonable margin who are hoping to cash in on the hippie population. In order for the Green Revolution to work, incentives must be matched for both the company and the consumers to save the environment. A good example of this, I believe, is what Quiznos has done:
They’ve redone all of their packaging to use recycled materials, but that isn’t that new. But what I do like is their new Quiznos tote bag. I can’t find it online, but my local Quiznos started selling this tote bag that gives you a free drink with sub purchase until the end of the year if you bring the bag. This is a much better way of selling environmentally friendly tote bags than my local grocery store, for example, where you’re just told to buy a tote for the environment. Here, both parties are actually benefiting so that the incentives are there. Quiznos doesn’t really lose money from the drink purchase because drinks are virtually costless, and they gain some margins on the extra sub they may have sold. And the cost of the tote bag, but that’s minor. Customers get a nice little tote bag and free drinks. And, the best part is, no more wasted plastic bags for take out orders. For all of their greening efforts, I applaud Quiznos.
Today I found this new shoebox design from Puma:
It’s supposed to replace the conventional shoebox. As a shoebox, it’s not overly amazing. It just replaces the box with a bag and an inner support. What I really like is how this reduces the need for plastic bags to hold the shoeboxes when people buy the shoes. Here, the idea is that the “shoebox” is a little bag, and you just pull out the tab and take it to go. Since most people buy one pair of shoes at a time, it’s nice to just take your shoes and go instead of putting the shoebox inside another bag. Of course, one downside is that we will lose the nostalgic storing of household goods in extra shoeboxes, but I think we already have enough extra shoeboxes to last for a while. This is a refreshing change.
