/green

With the big retailers and big brands and governments getting onboard it certainly seems so. Whether that's out of real concern for the environment and our planets finite resources or because it's now becoming an issue a growing number of customers care about and will vote with their feet on, is anyone's guess. However just going green, doesn't make your green, sometimes it can cause the opposite effect. I'm just back from a business trip in New York where Major Bloomberg has stopped all the recycling, citing the fact it was causing more environmental impact that it was saving (probably costing a lot too, but maybe I'm just a bit cynical). Anyway his view was if you're going to do it, do it properly, no good just running headlong in trying to do the 'right thing', better to think about and ensure what you do does have a real positive impact. It will be interesting to see how long the Big Apple needs to think on it before getting its rear into gear. We'll watch that space.

I’d say King of Shaves was definitely an early adopter on the green front as our very first product (King of Shaves Original Shaving oil) ticked a lot of green boxes when compared to more traditional steel or aluminium canned products:

• It uses much less packaging materials (by weight and volume)
• It uses a lot less energy to produce.
• The product itself comes primarily from a grown crop
• This crop requires only limited processing into the finished product
• The way it works means you only use a small amount of product each time, so you’re not washing a lot of product down the drain for someone else to deal with
• It’s naturally derived and biodegradable
• It’s small and lightweight so its transportation impact is minimal.

We launched this back in 1993 when green was far from the being the new black, but the thinking although more vogue today was just as relevant back then.

However, it's not yet a perfect solution and we are always reviewing the way we send it to market, how much packaging we use and what is / is not appropriate. Obviously there's always a tension between using the minimum packaging and getting something noticed on the shelves. Striking this balance is never that starightforward.

Our office manager Janey has just had a new water cooler installed. We've had a traditional one for years, the regular sort with the big plastic bottle on top. As with most businesses the well being of our team is important to us and we all know that drinking water is essential element of a healthy lifestyle. The water cooler really seemed to get people's water consumption up and fizzy pop and coffee consumption down, so it made sense.

However, shipping great big bottles of water around the countryside in lorries did seem a bit wasteful to us (even though they reuse the bottles).

Our new water cooler runs off mains water, it just treats and cools it with no need to truck bottles all over the countryside.

I guess we could have just reverted to drinking from the tap, but those days I fear are long gone.

Anyway, well done Janey

If you're of a similar vintage to (or older) than me you'll remember how milk came in glass bottles in the early hours of the morning onboard a milk float (and probably Benny Hill's Ernie song, what a classic?!). I guess these guys were really ahead of their time, not just recycling the glass, but re-using it, delivering it on electric vehicles, along with many other household suppliers (yoghurt, OJ, spuds etc). Interesting that the bottles and floats are all but gone and we buy milk in single use plastic bottles and in relative terms it's cheaper than ever. Although essentially it's our council tax money that pays for the recycling collections to take the plastic milk bottles (but not the lids!!!) away for recycling, so the milk probably does cost more in the end.

Strolling down memory lane again. To those a bit younger than I Corona is a Mexican beer. To me means lemonade, cream soda and Dandelion and Burdock and those crazy adverts with the talking bubbles working out in the gym. When I was a kid we used to collect discarded Corona bottles and take them back for the refunds that were on them. A simple system, but one that seemed to work i.e. you encourage people to recycle, you have to give them incentives. Still works in Europe, but much like the Milk float it's virtually gone from the UK. However, recycling is only going to work if its v easy to do, or there's something in it for someone (ideally the customer).