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Mightybytes goes Green! Part 1: What?!

by Travis Chandler

Tim, our fearless leader, is often coming up with ideas to improve our business. When he suggested recently that our company go green, we all cheered.

Perhaps referring to him as fearless is a tad extreme. When I say he's fearless I mean he doesn't fear irrational things, like, oh, cake. He fears no cake. But he does have rational fears, about things like, say, we humans screwing up our environment so badly that poor ol' Mother Earth can't fix herself back up again. And we, his employees, share that fear.

"But what's the first step in going green?" I asked in a trembling, afraid-of-new-things kind of way.

"Take a look at the 'eco-Andersonville Sustainable Business Certification Program Worksheet'" he boomed in a commanding baritone. Baritonally commanded, I did so. Once finished printing the sizable document I shook my fist at the heavens, suddenly realizing the irony of printing out on mashed-up trees a document specifically dedicated to reducing the amount of things we print out on mashed-up trees. Damn. Karma-wise, I deserved to be chopped up into cubes and scattered about the roots of a young sapling as fertilizer.

Upon reviewing the document, however, I was happily surprised. I think I had been picturing a one page list with check-boxes next to things like "Stop burning tires in the back yard, you jerk" and "Quit it with the chlorofluorocarbons already!" Instead, the seven page document sets up a star system. You know, zero stars = Union Carbide, 3 stars = Ghandi. That kind of thing. And the entire document is split into three main categories: People, Planet and Prosperity. All of which I am a fan of.

Perusing the list, right there on page one was “Participate in Buy Local First campaign”. I'm a huge fan of this idea, because of beer. This is why:

• I like beer.

• I not only like beer, I some times make it (see Mightybrew). Now that's local.

• When not drinking Mightybrew, I enjoy Goose Island 312, which is local and awesome.

I know they also make a beer called Green Line that they don't export out of the city (so there's no fuel burned in transporting it places) but I haven't tried that yet. 


Reading on, near the bottom of the first page, I see "Institute employee profit sharing plan" and my eyebrows shot up so fast that they actually leaped off of my head. I had to scramble around looking for them for a bit. Once I had them firmly back in place, I re-read it. Yep. Profit sharing. What the heck? Is that ecological? And even if it's not, why am I questioning it? 


Clearly, I don't yet understand what it is to be green. More research is needed. Jamming the word "green" into the always helpful Google search field led me to a great post from the folks at OddPodz on the many benefits a business can reap from going green. In it, they include a case study from the University of Texas on how FedEx accomplished this monumental task as well as a great guide from the UK's Carbon Trust on how businesses can calculate their carbon footprint. "But once you've calculated it," I wondered aloud to no one in particular, “how do you reduce it?”

I will be investigating this green mystery, and a variety of other emerald-hued queries, in this next series of blog entries. Stay tuned for more ecologically savvy, carbon-footprint shrinking, greener than a gardner's you-know-what bloggage!

Do you have a suggestion for a small business trying to go green? We'd love to hear it!

 

4 Comments

Thanks for the book rec. I’ll definitely check that out.

Andersonville Green Week (Chicago) is a great resource for small businesses exploring Greener steps too. Starts Monday July 12.
http://eco-andersonville.org/greenweek

From what I’ve read on the topic going green is no easy task, and I applaud Mightybytes for rising to the challenge.  I really enjoyed reading this post and I’ll be checking back in to see what it takes to go green.

Cheers,

Garin

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