Green Office #1

We are in the process right now (among many other projects!) of "greening" our office.

What does that mean?

A few weeks ago, Laurie was approached by a company that specializes in helping people create an environmentally-friendly workspace. 

Yesterday, we met with Michele, our "green consultant".  She came to the office and we spent 2 hours looking at the ways we function as a business and as individuals. 

We were happy to hear that we are headed in the right direction with many of the decisions we are already making!

Some of the initial things we found that we can (and will) improve on are:

• Making sure all our light bulbs are CFL's (right now we have a few lamps that still have incandescent bulbs)  She encouraged us to keep looking for CFL's if we're not happy with the color of certain ones - they keep getting better everyday.
• Re-wiring our appliances so that non-essentials (including TV, DVD player, Cable box, CD player, etc) can be switched off via a power strip when not in use.
• Canceling ALL magazines, catalogs, and extraneous mail pieces.  This is particularly important for us because many companies automatically send catalogs when we order from them online.  How silly!
• Changing our filing system so that we have most of our documents as backed-up PDF's rather than hard (paper) copies.  This is going to be a big one for us!
• Keeping the windows open in the office - indoor air quality is SEVEN times more toxic than outdoor (even in NYC)!  Furniture/carpeting glues and construction materials contribute to a lot of indoor pollution. UGH!!
• Keeping plants in the office to help absorb CO2 and VOC's.  Ficus Trees are supposed to be good for this, among others. (Of course this would mean we'd have to actually WATER them on a regular basis... hmm...)
• Looking into using soy-based printer ink.  We're interested to see how the quality of these inks work for office use - we already print a lot of our postcards, and other printed materials with soy ink, but it's done professionally.
• Using green cat litter/food for Dora, the office cat.  There are a LOT of options for this.
• Ordering biodegradable balloons for our upcoming Birthday Party Concerts.
• Putting aerators on the faucets in our kitchen and bathroom sinks.  This reduces the amount of water that comes out of the faucet, but the water pressure stays the same.

The next step will be for us to receive a report on even more ways we can reduce our carbon footprint and get started on making these changes. 

More to follow!

Comments

[Britany Crowder]

If you are looking for more environmentally friendly chemical to clean and whatnot, try Melaleuca products, they have cleaning stuff and practically everything you need with less impact on the planet. I swear by this stuff!! I use cleaning products in my house, shampoo for my daughter, lotions for family, toothpaste, they do it all!! Just wanted you to know that it would help in your greening project!!

Mother of a big fan, (and a fan myself),

Britany Crowder, and 3 year old Noelle