Think about it. Buying locally sends less money out of the area. Of course, it also means more jobs for the local area. These are well-known and documented. It also just makes sense that shortening the supply chain of the products you buy lowers its carbon footprint. In addition, locally owned businesses are much more likely to donate to local environmental and other non-profits, by some estimates 350% more.

And what other organization is going to represent the real economy in Washington? The big business community that is represented by the US Chamber of Commerce, which most media looks to for the business community’s position on issues like labor and climate change, clouds the issues around economic development and don’t have us and our communities in their best interest. We at Triple Pundit have news for you, people: that ain’t the real business community. What I’m witnessing here at BALLE is the real business community…entrepreneurs, Americans with a dream, people with values that include improving their local community. Yes, BALLE represents that hope, that someday the business community that is quoted in the media will be speaking from main street, USA, not from some faraway place. And it may be our best hope of ending taxpayer subsidies for big box development and other forms of corporate welfare.

Phew.

So here’s a question: how does BALLE help local chapters get started, without compromising their local flavor? The Northern Colorado Chapter has produced one tool that may help fledgling chapters unite their members and their community, educate their citizens, and make money in the process. They’ve developed software that will allow any BALLE chapter to create a coupon book for locally-owned businesses. The Northern Colorado Chapter has produced three coupon books, complete with maps of locally owned restaurants, and enough coupons to occupy a local-firster for a full year…until the next one comes out.

The question inevitably arises…Be Local Northern Colorado, specifically Gailmarie Kimmel, the chapter’s Co-Director, and Paul Jensen and Pam Sutton Gentile of One Tribal Creative, a design firm that is a member of the network, poured a lot of heart and soul into the development of the software and coupon book. If this was a traditional business model, they would want to maximize their return on investment by mass-producing the books for other chapters, doing all the design, layout, and publishing out of Fort Collins, CO, and just paying a local employee to distribute and sell the coupon books in each local chapter’s area. They would find one printer in their local area and print all the books for the entire country and then ship them around, to maximize economies of scale.

But this is the new economy. It’s not about making the same book and just changing out the advertisers. It’s about the advertisers. And the community they represent. So what to do?

Kimmel, Jensen and Gentile gave a workshop about this very issue (as well as some other very important branding and networking issues) at this year’s BALLE conference. They have been challenged by competition from publications that siphon advertising dollars out of their community, and do the publishing, design, layout, writing, and manufacture in other communities thousands of miles away, and ship to Colorado. But each of the three entrepreneurs agree: each local business alliance needs to retain its local flavor.

So they are making a gift to BALLE by donating their work, their sweat equity, to the greater good. The software will be available to other BALLE networks (if they want them), and the intellectual capital will be usable by all. The gift will be malleable. Each chapter can adapt it as they see fit, selling only online coupons, selling coupons of any design they choose, changing the coupon book layout to match their unique environs….or not using any of these tools at all.

This gift is truly inspirational and opens up opportunities for entrepreneurs in other communities to own their own publishing company, rather than centralizing it in one place.

It’s also a wakeup call to businesses in the Locals First movement. If you are advertising in a publication that is not locally owned, it’s not that much different than shopping at a big box store, is it?

Scott Cooney is the author of Build a Green Small Business: Profitable Ways to Become an Ecopreneur (McGraw-Hill), and hopes that someday, the green economy will simply be referred to as…the economy.

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GreenMoms started as a San Francisco Bay-Area group of women who met regularly to discuss their childrens’ health, eat eco-friendly vegetarian food, go berry-picking, and generally get active in their community.  Melinda McNaughton, the group’s founder, said that, “Once the group got going, it felt so good to have a network of people to share successes and challenges that it made it much easier to stay motivated to make green changes. We’re constantly inspiring each other with new ideas.”

McNaughton and business partner Janice Solimeno thought the idea of “Meeting Locally, Supporting Globally” was such a good one, they decided to take the group and turn it into an online community.

Community is the key word, as the site encourages groups to form in their own area, and to use the resources on the website, including the innovative GreenMometer, to share ideas and live healthier and more sustainable lives.  The site is growing rapidly, and groups are forming in such far flung places as Israel, Alabama, and Idaho.

Bringing sustainability to Moms may be one of the most crucial bridges the green movement must make.  Moms, especially new Moms, tend to be very interested in many aspects of green business as a result of widespread acknowledgment of the effects of harmful chemicals (agrochemicals in food, lead paint in Chinese toys, BPA in baby bottles, etc.).  If the green movement is to move beyond the San Francisco Bay Area, the Pacific Northwest, and the Northeast (and into red states), reaching Moms is very important. One of the best ways to reach them is through peer-to-peer interactions, exactly the kind that GreenMoms tries to facilitate on a local level.

The ethos of the site is “come as you are”.   McNaughton and Solimeno acknowledge that there are many shades of green, and that people may be coming to the site and forming groups that aren’t quite as eco-literate as others.  The beauty of this kind of website is that the tools like the GreenMometer make it really easy to go from curious to eco-savvy in no time, and with just a little effort.

Baby steps, if you will….

As the work is seasonal, it’s a slightly different business model and attracts a different kind of entrepreneur.  But the work is outdoors/get your hands dirty/shovel-ready kind of work that many people enjoy.  It takes a strong back and a willingness to work hard, but it just might be a terrific opportunity for you to help green your community, one yard at a time.

In today’s spotlight, I interview Chase Fetter, founder of Sage’s Way Landscape and Design of Salt Lake City. Chase has been doing permaculture in arid Salt Lake City for a half dozen years, and just entered into the market to do landscape maintenance in an eco-friendly manner as well, but that is a subject for another article.

SC:  When you design and install a landscape for someone, what are you mainly hoping to accomplish for them?
CF:  We focus on waterwise perennials, trees, and shrubs.  We also try to incorporate edibles to encourage people to reconnect with their back yards.

SC:  The focus on waterwise plants–how helpful is that to homeowners looking to cut water bills?
CF: We can cut water bills by half [for many people].

SC:  In a water limited state like Utah’s, that must be quite a seller.  How else can you help people save money while doing good for the environment?
CF: We can also block winter winds and/or cool the house in the summer with tree plantings.

Find more information about Sage’s Way Landscape and Design at www.SagesWay.net.

Scott Cooney is the author of Build a Green Small Business:  Profitable Ways to Become an Ecopreneur (McGraw-Hill), and hopes that someday the green economy will simply be referred to as…the economy.

Everyone’s cutting spending.  Everyone’s cutting payroll.  Everyone is hunkering down for the Great Depression.  Why should your green business be any different?

Here are some counterintuitive strategies for keeping your company strong during this recession.

1.  Go over the top with customer service. 

Businesses will be tempted to cut back at this time on the frills offered to customers.  Thus, your customers are likely receiving lousy customer service at other businesses, and yours will shine if you treat them well.  Everyone’s talking about the economy, which is a perfect time for your business to receive terrific word-of-mouth advertising. 

2.  Spend money to save money. 

Energy efficiency programs and rebates are getting a real shot in the arm from, among other things, the stimulus package, plus many other federal, state, and local programs.  As a result of the stimulus package, energy efficiency tax credits have been raised from 10% of cost to 30%.  The maximum credit has been raised from $500 to $1500, and more expensive upgrades, such as solar panels, solar water heaters, and geothermal pumps are not limited to the $1,500 maximum.  The $200 tax credit cap on efficient windows has been removed, however, the standards are also more stringent.  All of this means that there has never been a better time, financially, to upgrade, insulate, and/or weatherize your buildings.  These investments should pay for themselves relatively quickly, given the incentives and the energy savings, and provide long term savings in addition to good PR for your company.  For example, Jiminy Peak, a small ski resort in Massachusetts, put in a wind turbine at their resort.  With an up-front cost of roughly $4M and energy savings of $450,000 per year, the turbine will pay for itself in less than ten years and provide reliable electricity for many years after.  While this is a much larger investment than you might consider making, Jiminy Peak has protected itself from fluctuations in energy costs and power outages, and meanwhile given itself a nice PR victory. 

The Small Business Association also has a guaranteed loan program for construction and renovation including Energy Star appliances and upgrades.  The 7a Loan Guaranty Program has a high degree of flexibility in what you are able to use the money for, including energy efficiency, retrofitting, and new Energy Star upgrades. 

3.  Try to hook the big fish. 

Everyone is looking to save money.  Maybe there’s an account out there that wouldn’t have even considered you a while ago, but is perhaps looking for a fresh approach and might switch their business from someone else to you if you offer a deal.  Get your foot in the door and hope to build a rapport.  Kelly Giard, of Clean Air Lawn Care, has seen  little to no attrition in his client base, and cites the ‘premium’ customers he and his company seek.  “Common sense says be price competitive”, says Giard.  “The competitors who competed on price have been losing customers in this economy.  Because we stuck our chin out and said you should pay more for green, our customer retention has been around 90%.” 

4.  Reach out to your competition.

Odds are, they’re wrestling with similar thoughts.  Many co-ops formed during the Great Depression, and it’s possible that a modern day version would succeed during this recession, where you have a friendly agreement with your competitors, maybe you go out for a beer or coffee, and see if you can help each other succeed.  You might be surprised at what you find.  Say, for example, that you’re a green home cleaner.  If you reach out to others in your area, you might find them receptive to partnerships, co-promotion, swapping some customers who are closer geographically to you, spillover business if they’re fortunate enough to have some, etc. etc.

5.  Empower your employees.

With employees fearing layoffs, there is a concern over performance paralysis, cutthroat intra-office politics, and employees spending time jobsearching online instead of doing their job.  By empowering your employees to look for ways to save the company money, let them know they could help you avoid taking drastic steps.  It costs a lot of money to find, hire, train, and retain good employees.  Laying someone off is a last resort.  Be honest with employees.  Many times they are very willing to give up the perks of the job in exchange for a bit more job security, and in some cases, they may even allow for across-the-board salary cuts so that the risk of layoffs is much lower.  Your employees may find ways to save a lot of money, too, and do things that are good for the planet.  They might find energy savings, or carbon footprint savings, such as using teleconference and video conference instead of flying somewhere for meetings.  Making sure your employees are feeling good about their jobs is a great way to keep them happy and productive.  Try a CEO blog or regular town halls.  But whatever you do, be honest with them. 

6.  Invest in expansion.

This may perhaps seem the most counterintuitive of all strategies, however, when taken to its basics, there are sound fundamentals that emerge.  Why not make your business an opportunity for other aspiring eco-entrepreneurs?  It’s part consulting, part franchising, but without the logistical paperwork mess.  With so many people put out of work right now, there are many who are looking for opportunity, and might just pay you to find ways for themselves to make some money doing what you, in essence, do.  Mark Dullea, of Drysdales 1-2-3, a Massachusetts green carpet cleaning service, has seen good growth in this part of his business:  “Whereas my Boston-area natural carpet cleaning business is more or less holding its own right now, the real growth is occurring in my spin-off business start-up program.”

Congratulations to Dave, who has selected Sage’s Cafe, an organic, vegan restaurant in downtown Salt Lake City, as the green business of his choice for which he will receive a free lunch, compliments of Ecopreneur’s Guide!  Be on the lookout for next month’s Eco-Quiz!

In your pool of customers, there are big fish and little fish.  Enough little fish will keep you fed, clothed, and support your family.  Being a small business, you’ve always catered to the little fish, and figured one day, maybe, you’d land a big fish.  Whether it’s a large account, or just premium customers of the LOHAS demographic that have a little more money to spend, this may well be the time to go after these customers. 

Odds are, with everyone else cutting back on their marketing, promotions, and customer service, if you were to cast a line out there for one of those big fish, you might find them already thinking about their options. 

It may be a big account, and if you play your cards right and do solid customer relations management, you might just get your foot in the door and build rapport.  Or, it may be premium customers that are looking for over-the-top service and quality in an eco-friendly fashion, and are willing to pay extra for it. 

“Common sense says be price competitive,” says Kelly Giard of Clean Air Lawn Care.  “The competitors who competed on price have been losing customers in this economy.  Because we stuck our chin out and said you should pay more for green, our customer retention has been around 90%.”

So go ahead, bait that hook and throw it out there, in the deeper waters of the pond.  Maybe you’ll get a little tug on the line.  Now nice and easy, reel ‘em in…

First one to email in the correct answer and a creative solution to the wasteful problem gets a $10 gift certificate to a locally owned green business of their choice in their area! 

About the Eco-trivia:  The Ecopreneur’s Guide will sporadically post eco-trivia questions.  The contest is highly unregulated, no purchase necessary, don’t have to be 21 to win, standard contest rules apply, only one answer per reader, blah blah blah, yadi yadi yadi, etc.  Email answers directly to Scott via his gmail account, which can be found on several other pages on this blog. 

Try this: empower your employees. Give them even more reign over your company. Task them with righting the ship. Elevate them, during this time of crisis, to the level of partner. Ask them to think like an owner. Odds are, they have some ideas of how to save money. And odds are really good that it would not be layoffs.

Employees might band together and take temporary paycuts, consider equity in exchange for work in the short term, or restructure their pay platform so that more money comes in bonuses if the company does well, and less is guaranteed hourly rates.

They may also save you in other ways. They’re likely to know how you can save on energy, water, and other resources. They’re likely to know your customers better than you do, and have a few ideas for you. Create an open forum, such as a CEO blog, or town hall meetings, and you might be surprised what you’ll learn when you open up the floor.

If this is such a great idea, why don’t companies do this all the time? The key here is that in this economy, people feel like they’re more part of a team. It’s a “We’re all in this together” mentality. The saying goes, “A crisis is a terrible thing to waste.” This openness and willingness among your employees is perhaps never going to be more present than right now, so take full advantage. Other unforeseen benefits may also arise, like finding new leaders, or one of your employees showing interest in partnership.

Photo credit:  Running with Scissors on Flickr Creative Commons

Barack Obama won his first legislative battle with the Republican minority in congress and passed the Economic Stimulus package he feels is needed to jumpstart America’s economy. 

The package includes money for what many are calling the green economy.  Obama has committed $15 B annually to clean energy programs, including wind, solar, biofuels, energy efficiency, geothermal, and others.

What’s in it for the eco-entrepreneur?  Or, as many are now calling it, the ‘Obamapreneur’?

The quickest wins and lowest hanging fruit for the green economy and Obama’s plans lie in energy efficiency.  As the saying goes, the cleanest power plant is the one you don’t have to build, and with buildings accounting for 72% of all energy usage in the U.S., greening these buildings would provide good jobs, and freedom from high energy bills.  Robert Pollen, an economist at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, estimates there are $26 B worth of upgrades on public buildings alone in the U.S. that need to be done, with terrific return on investment for the government in terms of job creation and long term savings on energy.

Obama’s economic team has estimated that 5 million green jobs will be created by this $15B in annual investment, and that these jobs will be difficult to outsource or replace.

It may be less obvious to see the effect on aspiring entrepreneurs and small business owners, but the possibilities are good.  People interested in becoming an energy audit specialist are going to be in high demand as we green up all these buildings.  If you want to learn more, you can visit Housing and Urban Development’s Home Energy Saver tool. The key, if you are looking to get into greening for low-income housing and government buildings, is to be sure you are familiar with Title 1.  A list of Title 1 approved lenders can be found at this address, and it would behoove you to become familiar with their customs and preferred work patterns.  Less scrupulous contractors scammed the government while working on subsidized housing, and as part of the effort to clean up the corruption, Title 1 approved lenders are maintaining databases of reliable contractors.  While most of these have traditionally been remodeling and repair, the energy efficiency spending in the stimulus package will become quite the boon to contractors in that niche, so long as they are reliable and trustworthy.

If you’re looking to join a team to do efficiency work, two good options currently exist:   Green Irene and Sustainable Spaces.  These companies allow you to be your own boss and provide training to get you going.

The other major takeaway from the stimulus package, without getting too bogged down in the details, is to see that Obama has made a clear signal of where he intends to steer the ship.  It would be easy for him focus on the symptoms of the problem, as his predecessor did, and maybe get a few quick wins without sticking his neck out too far, but he has not lost site of what got us into this trouble.  Deficits, climate change, and dependence on foreign oil are real problems, which, “left unaddressed, will continue to weaken the economy and threaten national security,” he said.  The fact that he is signaling such a clear direction means that entrepreneurs will know where to put their money and effort in the energy, building, and transportation sectors, knowing that the federal government is behind them, at least for the next four years.

Photo Credit Joel Washing on Flickr Creative Commons

There’s a lot of information out there about carbon offsets.  For small businesses, what is the most important?  How can you know that purchasing carbon offsets is actually reducing overall carbon emissions globally?  Where does the money go?  You certainly don’t have the time to research all companies offering to offset your carbon footprint (In the SF bay area alone – 3Degrees, Terrapass, LiveNeutral, The Carbon Neutral Company, Greatest Planet…), but you still want to make an informed choice.

The key is to find an independent third party certifying body, such as Green-e, that endorses the offsets you’re buying.   Green-e certifies  that a carbon offsetting company is actually doing what they claim that they are doing with your money.

If you’re the kind of entrepreneur who likes to understand everything that’s happening, there are a couple of key terms you might want to familiarize yourself with.  Additionality means that the the carbon offsets you purchase actually support a REAL project (examples include wind and solar power, forestry, and methane capture and combustion ) that would otherwise not have happened without your extra money.  Permanence means that the project you’re supporting isn’t just temporary – the forest won’t be burned to the ground next year, the wind farm won’t be dismantled after Christmas, etc.   Additionality and permanence are also independently certified by organizations like Green-e.

There’s more to consider, of course. For example, 3Degrees screens their Verified Emission Reduction (VER) projects before selling offsets to businesses by, among other criteria, analyzing risk and exploring potential sustainable development co-benefits of the project.