Turning Green: How to Make Your Store More Eco-Friendly
These days, it just takes a game plan and commitment to make a store more eco-conscious
By Tina Benitez -- Gifts and Dec, 2/1/2009 12:00:00 AM
Tanya Peel believes in the reincarnation of material things. When she needed shelves for her new store, she searched Craig’s List and found an old, wooden cupboard that someone was going to throw out, which she’s using to shelve her products. Her Woodland Hills, CA store, All Things Green, has been online since March 2008 and will officially open its doors this March.
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| Timberland keeps its store look sleek and eco-conscious with repurposed materials. |
The store was designed and operates using as much recycled material as possible. Peel’s approach isn’t too far-fetched. Retailers are beginning to realize that there’s more to designing and maintaining an eco-friendly store than meets the eye, and it’s something that can be done economically, if materials can be repurposed. Peel’s store has been green since its inception, and one way she maintains it is through packaging. Multiple-sized boxes, envelopes and other packaging that products arrive in are reused to ship items back out to customers. She puts a stamp on each package so customers know her eco shipping efforts. Shredded paper is also used to pack items like glass and other fragile items, and everything down to the actual products being sold leave a minimal, negative imprint on the environment. Customers can stock up on all repurposed or eco-friendly products such as bags, bottles, clothing, toys, and even non-toxic cleaning products like those by Eco Discoveries, Atlanta at her store, and they cost the same as well-known brands like Clorox or Tide. “If you just continue consuming without ever thinking about why we consume and what the story is behind the product we are consuming then change can never take place,” said Peel.
There’s another side to being green. Retailers can sell eco products but be wasteful in their practices. Lack of energy efficiency or overuse of papers and plastics for purchases and packaging is one major challenge to becoming green. To save energy, Peel uses a router and plugs everything into it, so there’s one plug to go off when the day is done. Plastic costs and waste will be cut significantly since Peel plans on giving customers a 10 percent discount every time they bring their own bag to her store to shop.
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The Skull bag by Get Hip Get Green |
Other bag options on the market include those made of non-woven polypropylene, which are sturdy, affordable and reusable, according to Peter Shore, president of Gift Box Corporation, a Carlstadt, NJ-based vendor of gift packaging materials. And bags made of PET or crushed water bottles can provide better colors and allow better registration of prints for unique designs. “Retailers need to promote the whole concept of reuse as opposed to throwing away,” said Shore.
While eco-friendly practices are just as important as the products being sold in a green store, store design is another important factor.
Turning Green
When customers look into the storefront, they should see the green imprint. It’s their window — literally — into an eco-conscious store. Everything from VOC paints to LED lighting can make the difference. One energy tip that sticks for Kathy Walsh, owner of Homeward Bound of New Milford, CT, is lighting. She’s tested different compact fluorescent lights, but they make her displayed merchandise look “washed out.” Instead, she opted for a combination of incandescent and halogen bulbs, which save one-third electricity and last longer. “This seems to us the area in which new technology could most fruitfully be applied,” said Walsh.
When working on the design of a store, the less is more approach works best when starting out. “If you’re going to remodel a store, make sure you are not remodeling just to go green and you’re actually remodeling for a purpose,” said Kara Walker, lead designer, LEED approved professional at JGA, Southfield, MI. “It’s one thing to repaint, but if you say we should take out this carpet for more environmentally friendly carpeting, then you’re just creating extra waste that you don’t really need. It’s more than just in your store. It’s been manufactured, transferred and now it has this life cycle and end-of-life cycle. That’s the bigger picture.”
JGA recently helped outdoors retailers like Timberland and North Face, which both used recycled materials in store renovations and exhibits. At North Face’s Boise, ID, store, both the building owner and retailer had a goal of acquiring Gold Level LEED Certification, an accreditation given to buildings that are proven to be environmentally responsible through their efforts to save water and energy, and reduce harmful greenhouse emissions and other wastes.
The site of an old department store, the three-story building was going to be demolished, so all materials that could be recycled were salvaged for the new store, including the original brick walls, cast iron rivets, metal beams and the columns around the store’s perimeter.
For those that are just jumping into green, Tim Wersell, senior draftsman and LEED-AP at JGA, said two words: start small.
Simply turning the lights off in rooms that are not in use or installing motion light switches that turn them off automatically is a good option for starters. Recycling programs are also a great way to get started. Figure out the store’s mission in going green next. “[Store owners] need to find out what is important to them,” said Walker. “Is it being energy efficient? Is it about reducing toxins, reducing the carbon footprint on the world? Are they sourcing products locally? Do they have a say with packaging?” She added that even if product is not being transported locally, retailers can control how the product leaves the store, which goes back to the bags, tissues or lack of bags being used or the box it’s shipped in. Secondary, or recycled packaging, is the better option.
“Secondary packaging is important because it’s the first thing the customer sees,” said Dennis Salazar, Salazar Packaging, Plainfield, IL, “especially if you are dealing over the Internet and have a green business; the first real contact your customer has with you is the package arriving by UPS, FedEx or USPS.”
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Recycleable cardboard boxes from Salazar Packaging give retailers a greener option for shipping |
Repacking
Salazar and his wife Lenora started the company, which offers secondary packaging to All Things Green and dozens of other retailers around the country, after more than 40 combined years working in shipping and distribution. They offer “stuff that everyone takes for granted” when shipping, according Salazar — from recycled boxes and envelopes to eco-friendly pastes, paper mailers and labels.
He thinks retailers are still behind in their packaging and shipping practices. Misconceptions that green packaging is expensive and has a long lead time are to blame. In reality, the opposite is true, Salazar notes. “You can buy minimum quantities at about the same price you pay for normal packaging,” he said. “You can afford to do this and should do this for eco consistency.”
As the misconceptions subside, going green will be more than a trend and more a way of business for most, but more retailers still need to commit. “I don’t necessarily think it’s a trend that’s ever going to die,” said Peel. “It’s the new future that we will all start to embrace.”
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Gifted Retailer Roundtable
Mar 31, 2009 -
What are you doing to make your store greener?
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Gifted Retailer: The Heights Gallery
May 15, 2009 -
Gifted Retailer: Curious Sofa
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