As an entrepreneur, you may at times question your sanity : long hours, uncertain outcomes, energy drain on the rest of your life. And yet you keep on going. You have to. The thrill of successfully launching a new endeavor, whether to make a living, a difference in the lives of people, an impact on the health of the planet, or all of the above is too great not to. And yet, there may be times that nothing’s coming to…
By now you’ve likely heard of microfinance, and the idea behind it — lending a small amount of money to support a person in the developing world create or enhance a business, and they pay back the money on very palatable terms. A small amount goes a long way, coupled with the ingenuity born of necessity. Sound familiar, entrepreneurs? It sounds like a fine idea, but you haven’t gone there yet. What’s stopping you? Perhaps it still somehow sounds like…
There’s been a lot of energy behind wind power these days, with talk of larger and more dramatic installations every week. But this may leave you wondering, what does it have to do with me? Would I ever want one of these giant towers in my backyard or on my business? Noble though the idea is, for many, this is not an appealing or feasible option, due to space limitations or code restrictions. But then you may wonder, would a…
For most people, shipping something quickly internationally boils down to a small bowl of alphabet soup: DHL, UPS, or FedEx. End of story. It’s just how things get done. But for an increasing number of people, they’re aware of the fact that airplane flight plays a major part in contributing to global climate change. But most only know part of the story. In a conversation with Justin Brown of First Global Xpress, I began to find out: All the major…
Junk Mail. Two words, a lot of impact. 100 million trees worth annually in the US, along with the resources used to print them, plus the resulting additional emissions generated carrying them around to their final destination, your mailbox. What to do, aside from recycle? The first option that may come to mind is the well advertised Green Dimes service. It does indeed seem to do a great job at reducing mailings, up to 90% in three months, and they…
You’ve heard all the arguments about why you should ride your bike: It reduces auto traffic, shrinks your carbon footprint, decreases your transportation costs, and gives you killer calves. But there’s one niggling problem: theft. It seems no matter how many locks, cables, and snakes you use, at one point or another, you’re likely to return to your bike, to find one lone orphaned tire, the rest long gone. Whether or not this has been your experience, it’s a perception…
Have you been pondering getting your feet wet in the ever expanding world of green business? Perhaps you’re already in it, to a degree, but want to go deeper. An MBA perhaps? Online MBA? Sustainable Development? Design? But where? Coming next Thursday, I’m going to tell you what I know from personal experience at one of the premier places today to get a sustainability focused MBA: Presidio School of Management. But first, let me tell you what else I know,…
If you’re like many ecopreneurists out there, you have a great idea or three cooking on the back burner right now, that could be a full fledged company, or perhaps a powerfully beneficial invention. And you think, with a little financial push and a lot of advice, it could really do something, becoming more then doodles on a napkin. Or perhaps you’re already up and running (like crazy) and some extra eyes, ears to help finesse what you’ve got going…
A few years back, while I was still a student at Presidio School of Management, this vivacious, crazy eyed scientist came and told us about the biolubricants that his company WISE Solutions had been working on. My mind of course went to, shall we say, personal lubricants, and I began to tune out. But it turned out to be much different. You see, they were working on plant based lubricants, to be used (at the time) in vehicles. He shared…
