Business Going Green:
Kansas City consultant emphasizes
designs to benefit the environment

Today, more than ever, sustainable business means more than profitability. Innovative businesses are realizing the necessity to balance short-term earnings with planetary stewardship.

Small Planet Partners, a Kansas City consulting firm, specializes in developing environmentally sound, socially just and profitable businesses. Founder Willow Lundgren understands the dynamic between a business's bottom line and its investment in the greater good.

"This quote from (former Wisconsin senator and environmental advocate) Gaylord Nelson, 'the economy is a wholly-owned subsidiary of the environment,' was something of a wake-up call for me as a business person," says Lundgren. "Look around the home or office right now. Consider that everything man-made originates from materials that were once grown or mined. That shines a new light on environmental protection. It's a strategic business issue."

Designing for the environment is a systematic way to design products and processes that consider environmental impacts from the outset.

"This mindset can deliver exponential business benefits by providing a 'lens' for innovation. Companies can save money by eliminating pollution and waste, and can also create a market advantage," says Lundgren.

Case in point: Swiss textile company Rohner Textil worked with architect William McDonough and chemist William Braungart, co-authors of the book Cradle to Cradle, Remaking the Way We Make Things, to eliminate all toxic or heavy metals and carcinogenic dyes from their products. By switching to safe dyes they created a fundamental competitive advantage and became the major supplier of environmentally friendly fabrics to customers like Herman Miller Inc. for its growing line of eco-products for home and office furnishings.

"Businesses that consider what happens at the end of their products' useful life at the start of the design process can realize tremendous benefits" says Lundgren. She points to Nestlé as an example. The company will debut 100 percent recyclable Christmas candy selection boxes this year. "By making one simple change — replacing plastic insert trays with a paper-based display card instead — Nestlé will eliminate 200 tons of packaging." Last year Nestlé kept candy the same size, but shrunk boxes by 40 percent — saving shipping costs and reducing waste.

Dow Chemical re-engineered a process to recapture and scrub hydrochloric acid used to make chlorinated organic compounds. It not only reduced caustic waste by 6,000 tons per year, but Dow's investment of $250,000 saved $2.4 million annually on the cost of materials and waste disposal.

Another benefit of environmentally sustainable business decisions is the preservation of natural resources that are important for a company's future. Lundgren cites as an example Anheuser-Busch Inc., with which she worked on an initiative to promote a cleaner Chesapeake Bay. "During the project they realized that their actions were not only creating good publicity, but were helping to sustain clean water, an aspect of the environment that was strategic to their business," she explains.

Environmental stewardship in business is also being driven by a more educated, demanding and connected consumer. "In the digital and social media era where citizens are journalists and a provocative idea from one individual anywhere in the world can catch fire and circle the globe overnight, businesses must recognize that greater transparency is mandatory in today's business climate," says Lundgren.

Walmart's Product Sustainability Index is an example of how one company is working to provide this transparency throughout its entire supply chain. The giant retailer is attempting to rate more than 100,000 product suppliers regarding their impacts on energy and climate, natural resources, material efficiency, and people and community.

Traditional marketing is no longer an adequate means to reach consumers who have access to a variety of non-traditional information sources. From Lundgren's view, "There is an epidemic of an erosion of trust among consumers and buying commercial space is much less productive than it used to be."

Lundgren points to community-based social marketing techniques as a more effective way to advertise in our changing world. There are great opportunities for business sustainability efforts to plug into existing organizations that are passionate about these issues. Tools such as Facebook, Myspace, and Twitter carry the message to people who share the same values. "This is an extension of the number one form of advertising, word of mouth," she explains.

Word-of-mouth advertising also can be created through community action. Lundgren describes how office supply giants Staples and Best Buy promote their businesses by accepting a variety of electronics waste, like old computers and printers. This service solves a problem for the consumer, brings people to the store, and keeps hazardous materials out of local landfills. "This action creates new customers and a good name for the business, while helping the environment," she observes.

Although sustainable business practices are beneficial to companies on many levels, Lundgren understands the difficulty in shifting to such practices. "Many organizations are caught between quarterly performance numbers and long-term growth," she says. Businesses that have been willing to set goals beyond the quarterly numbers are often rewarded.

She explains that a business's first step towards sustainability is awareness. "The demand for change starts with individuals and small enclaves, which shifts a mindset, which can shift an entire culture." Her firm helps companies identify and apply principles of sustainability within their own businesses. This, she says, can transform thinking and spark lasting eco-innovation. "It's tremendously gratifying work to help one another awaken to possibilities that preserve our Earth and simultaneously reduce operating costs and increase profits."

This story was featured in the September 2009 newsletter