The Basics of Greening Your Business

You can (and should) promote your business on the bag with the message that this is a reusable bag. You can even check out reusablebags.com to get an idea of what you can offer your customers.

Yes, there will be an initial cost, but, in the long run, once you have armed your customers with bags, you will spend far less buying paper or plastic bags in bulk.

Another option, if you own a retail store in a mall, is to team up with other store owners and buy bags together with the names of several stores or the name of the mall, therefore making it the bag for shopping at a variety of stores.

The point is, as a retail store owner, one of the most obvious ways to go green is to significantly decrease the use of disposable bags. Any environmentally friendly business owner should try to instill in his or her employees the understanding that disposable bags are unnecessary. Give out reusable bags for bringing lunch, going on lunchtime shopping trips or other uses.

#64 Encourage Alternative Forms of Commuting

Although it is encouraged by many local municipalities with carpool lanes, carpooling remains one underutilized form of saving energy. Vanpooling with a designated (hired) driver is another alternative that is growing slightly in popularity. Large companies may subsidize the entire cost, while small businesses may have riders pay a minimal fee that amounts to less than paying for gas to commute to and from work on a daily basis.

One step that a growing number of businesses are taking is rewarding employees who use alternate forms of transportation. For example, Advanced Micro Devices (AMD Quote) in Austin, Texas, issues bus passes to all employees who use mass transit and rewards employees who carpool or vanpool with gift cards to local businesses.

Safeco Insurance offers subsidies and incentives to employees who use any of the 80 active vanpools it has set up throughout the country. New Belgium Brewery encourages biking to and from work by giving each employee who has been with the company for a year a bicycle. Nice.