Let’s really really talk small business and climate change. Because and as we know with the recent news. Also regarding the effects that climate change. It will have on our world and it’s more important than ever that small businesses do their part. Yes to be environmentally responsible and engage in best practices. Practices that aren’t just good for the Earth but are also good for their bottom-line.
Restaurants
While banning plastic straws for their environmental mayhem is all the rage right now, despite claims of ableism. Meaning there are greater steps that your small business / restaurant can take. Take to be a better ally to the planet.
Therefore, rather than putting the onus on your business for utensils and plateware, suggest your customers bring their own. Or you can purchase eco friendly utensils and then problem solved. Your clientele will see you reducing both your environmental footprint and partially bill.
You can also opt for reusable bottles, coffee cups, and other dishware. Most noteworthy, it also helps to promote a more vegetarian menu to reduce for water and carbon footprint. As well as improve the sustainability of your food sources. This will no question help you. Help in catering to a growing vegan and vegetarian populace. As a bonus, make sure the fruits and vegetables you’re buying meet the sustainability trifecta. That equals being seasonal, organic, and local.
Take your sustainability beyond just individual behavior by integrating recycling into your business model. Recycle more than just the dishes. Compost food scraps and donate them to a local garden, recycle your used cooking oil into biofuel. So the more integrated your sustainability is into the core of your businesses. Therefore this will be a more effective way that you’re sending a message to larger companies. Those that are investing in sustainability. Cause is worth it to their bottom line.
Retail Shops
Running your own shop presents many opportunities. All for you to engage in and promote environmentally friendly practices. Such as and including replacing the items you stock with greener alternatives to ensure your business practices.
Furthermore, ensuring you use biodegradable cleaning products. They totally reduce your reliance on and exposure to toxins that might seep into the environment. Also and more noteworthy switching to LED lights. Not only do they look better, but they last longer and use less energy, saving you hundreds of dollars over time.
Landscaping
Because of the nature of agriculture and controversies around complex topics like GMOs and pesticides. So being green while working in the landscaping industry has historically been difficult. Recent trends, however, have helped to better enable small landscaping businesses to thrive and expand their practices.
Among those trends is urban farming. Cause the practice of growing vegetables in small plots of land in metropolitan areas rocks. As well as increased prevalence of organized and managed community gardens. Urban farms, as a matter of both practicality and principal, avoid the use of hazardous chemicals and pesticides, but this allows you to market alternatives and promote other urban farming-friendly practices for customers and clients to take up. It’ll also allow you to branch into managing composting bins for busy urbanites, as well as doing routine landscape maintenance on their green spaces.
As a landscape business-owner, you’re also in a great position to sell clients on sustainable and environmentally-friendly practices, like xeriscaping, using synthetic grass, installing green walls, and making use of reusable landscaping materials.
Laundromats
For those of us operating long-held family laundromats! Can you say the prospect of switching to be more environmentally-friendly? Because by doing things like reducing water usage and reducing heat use might sound more cash than being eco. Becoming more energy and environmentally conscious, however, doesn’t mean reduction in the quality. Or your customers have come to expect. In fact, you’ll end up saving hundreds of dollars in operational costs.
For example, you can switch to high-efficiency front-loading washers. They reduce water use and potential waste. Thereby saving both you and the environment from millions of wasted gallons of water. You can also switch to cold water only cycles. The formulas detergents use no longer necessitate the use of hot water for a thorough cleaning.
By using cold water instead of hot water, you save the cost of heating water and thousands of pounds of carbon emissions per machine. Another measure you can take is stocking all-natural laundry detergents and non-chlorine bleach, both of which safer for the environment, kinder to fabrics and your skin, and cost-efficient. By stocking these, you can introduce your customers to better products, help them eliminate trips to the store, increase your profits, and, of course, help protect the environment.
What else can small businesses do?
While small businesses across the board can implement the above-suggested changes, the world also benefits when business owners use their voice and buying power to advocate for larger systemic and institutional changes.
As a small business owner, you can work to increase your own awareness of environmental issues. Especially within your industry by educating the local community and governments about environmental challenges your business faces. Then you can advocate for utility companies to switch to alternative, renewable energy sources. Those like wind, solar, and geothermal. You can even encourage employees to use public or carbon-neutral transportation options like an electric car. Another option is to switch for “green web hosts”. Ones who take measures to reduce the environmental costs. Costs of their servers and infrastructure have on the Earth.
You have power in your voice and your actions. Now, more than ever, it’s important that you see yourself and your business as a force for positive change when it comes to our shared environment and the planet we live on.
