How to Make Your Business More Eco-Friendly

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From saving energy to positive PR, it’s important to get your small business on the path to becoming greener. This World Environment Day, we’re encouraging small businesses to take the step to become more eco-friendly.

World Environment Day is the United Nations’ most important day for encouraging worldwide awareness and action for the protection of our environment. As an entrepreneur, it’s important to start taking the right steps in order to reduce your company’s energy consumption at the beginning. Becoming a more environmentally friendly business can be rewarding for both, the environment and your pockets.

Some of the many reasons to go green:

• Saving money from reducing energy consumption
• Improved workplace by reducing harmful toxins and waste
• Public response—your customers will only be happy that you’ve made the switch to become greener
• You’re helping the planet!

Here are some steps on how you can move your company onto a greener path.

1. Check how green your company is. Evaluate where your company stands in terms of your environmental profile and carbon footprint. Check to see how much power and water your business consumes. Then, take a look through your company’s operations and see if there are any ways you can reduce your consumption. You can encourage employees to take a day and work from home, which will cut down on greenhouse gas emissions. If that’s not possible for your small business, you could offer a discount or reimbursement on public transit costs or implement a carpool system to cut down on car emissions.

2. Switch to greener products. Switching to greener products is easier than it seems. Here are some tips:

• Use a laptop or tablet instead of a computer, which will cut down on energy or
• Switch to LED light bulbs, which use less energy and emit less heat, as well as reducing your air conditioning bill
• Limit what you print to cut waste, reuse it as scrap paper and recycle it
• Use PWC paper, which is made entirely of the paper we recycle in our bins, uses 45% less energy, and creates half the waste of traditional papermaking process
• Switch to more biodegradable cleaners, which will reduce your exposure to the toxins and reduce their introduction into the environment
• Consider purchasing used or vintage office furniture and supplies instead of brand new pieces as an alternative form of recycling
• Turn off lights if they are not in use for 15 minutes or more and shut down computers when you leave from the office
• Use natural lights in the winter to cut down on the energy used for the lights, and keep the blinds shut in the summer to reduce the amount of effort it takes to cool down a room.
• Purchase re-manufactured ink and toner cartridges and reusable pens with refills to limit the amount of plastic trash

By following even a few of these simple steps your company is already on its way to becoming more environmentally friendly and saving money. Your company can also benefit from this by creating an environmental mission statement to tell your customers that you are becoming more eco-friendly. This World Environment day, evaluate your company’s carbon footprint and make a change for the better.

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