Naked Sells

“We plan to triple our sales of what we call Good for You products, including fruit and vegetable juices, oatmeal, nuts, seeds, low-fat dairy, sports drinks for athletes over the next decade,” explained Dr. Derek Yach, Senior Vice President, Global Health Policy, PepsiCo in a private interview with me today at the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI).  Naked is one of PepsiCo’s nutritious juice brands and they tell me that Naked is definitely Good for You.

“The growth rate of healthy foods will exceed that of our other product areas – the ones we call Better for You, and Fun for You.” Additionally, reported Yach, PepsiCo seeks to make the Better and Fun products healthier; provide better labeling so that consumers can make informed choices; conduct more responsible marketing; and promote physical fitness.

Health, nutrition…this sounds like pretty suspicious stuff for a for-profit company, right?

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Microsoft works with Demi and Ashton in new initiative to protect children

I am proud to work for a company like Microsoft that has a long-standing commitment to protecting children. I am especially pleased to be able to share that Microsoft is participating in a new collaborative effort with other technology companies, advocates and the Demi and Ashton Foundation (DNA) to find new ways to put technology to work protecting children from sexual exploitation and abuse.

Today, I joined Demi Moore and Ashton Kutcher, the co-founders of the DNA Foundation, at the annual Clinton Global Initiative meeting in New York City to discuss this effort.  At the event, the DNA Foundation launched their “Real Men” campaign to raise awareness about the issues of child sex trafficking and exploitation. They also shared some information about the work Microsoft and others have been exploring with them in a task force to develop creative technological solutions to help address this horrible problem.

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Do You Choose Your Customer or Do They Choose You?

What does it mean to be a sustainable business?  Does it mean a company produces a ‘green’ product or service from a sustainable supply chain?   Does it mean the company must also maintain sustainable internal business process?  What about the product once it leaves the front door?  Many companies today are looking up the value chain and asking: Are we defining, attracting, and selling to the right customers?

In a recent post, Why Monetary Circulation Is Critical to Business Sustainability, we follow the flow of money and resources through a continuous cycle.  The quality of the dollar coming in is often as important as the quality of product going out. 

 With the shift in consumer preferences over the past few years, companies have been aggressive to respond to the growing ‘green’ value opportunity.  However, lifecycle questions remain on company responsibilities once the products are in the hands of the consumer. 

Does a sustainable business need to market and sell to a responsible consumer to be sustainable?

As a personal sustainability consultant and an advocate for sustainable change in business, I express to clients, peers, and friends that everything we buy is an expression of consumer preference.  This purchase choice tells the business world that we approve of the product and service they are providing.  On the flip-side, businesses also have a responsibility to position their products and services in a way to attract the right consumers.

The good news for business is there seems to be a general trend towards increasing eco awareness and a decreasing resistance for more sustainable products.  In fact, a recent survey indicates that 34 percent of American consumers are more likely to buy environmentally responsible products today, and another 44 percent indicate their environmental shopping habits have not changed as a result of the economy.  Specifically, younger consumers are expecting more from their green purchases and their consumer behavior is reflected in these desires.

As a sustainability consultant, I am enthusiastic about the shifting preferences of consumers.  Raising eco awareness and everyday purchases of more sustainable products and services is transforming business actions to bring responsible products to conscious consumers.  Let’s keep the cycle going!

Teachers are the key to providing children with quality education

In 2008, we announced a commitment at the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) to train 10 million teachers by 2015. We undertook this goal, because we believe that every child has the right to a quality education. Throughout the course of a child’s education, there is perhaps no more important influence than the teachers that guide, nurture, and inspire learning.

Strong teacher education programs are one of the key ways that we can help ensure that all children have access to great teachers.  Through the Microsoft Partners in Learning Program, we have invested in 115 countries since 2003 to support quality teacher education, the use of technology in learning, and ongoing professional development as part of our commitment to education.

To date we have reached almost 8 million teachers, and we are continuing to invest in more teacher outreach and training to ensure we reach the goal we set as part of the CGI commitment.

By working with teachers around the world through the Partners in Learning program, we’ve also learned that we need to do more to support the school environments in which teachers work. School leaders need training and ongoing professional development to support transformative change. One teacher can make great things happen in a classroom, but several teachers with supportive, strong leadership can make a whole school great.  And a great school has positive implications for a whole community.

Read on at Microsoft’s Unlimited Potential blog and learn more about Innovative Schools in action by looking at videos on Microsoft’s Partners in Learning website.

Join Greenopolis & “The Cove” Producer For A Special Live Conference 9/23

What will unleash human creativity to solving the earth’s crisis? This is a unique chance to get inspired, connect with a small group of other committed environmentalists, and even to “take the stage” as a Green Ambassador.

Free Registration Here
 
To start the conversation, Charles Hambleton, producer of the Academy-award winning movie “The Cove”, will tell us about some of his amazing and inspiring stories from around the globe. (Bio below.)
 
Then, it’s a unique chance for YOU to lend your voice and actually meet some other amazing people. Using a new social media technology for rallying with live voices rather than keyboards, Greenopolis will connect with you in small groups and create a vision together of how our individual and collective creativity can drive environmental conservation.
 
You can also take the first steps toward being a part of the new Green Ambassador program from Greenopolis. This will help you can get involved, be recognized, and even have the option to present during future sessions.
 
This is *not* a presentation … it’s a way to actively jump in! And, you’ll earn 100 Greenopolis points just for being a part of the conversation.
 
And you can register FREE!

Love or Hate a Bright Idea?

“An idea that is not dangerous is unworthy of being called an idea at all.” ~ Oscar Wilde

How does your organization react to ideas? Threatened? Welcomed?  A powerful idea has the potential to rattle the cage.  And while executives, managers and workers sing the praise of innovation, how can innovation thrive if ideas are squashed?

Employees are often argued to be the greatest resource of a company.  But are all employees valued equally when it comes to innovation?   Is there a means to communicate that innovation up through the organization?

One culprit in the innovation process stems from limited organizational structures.  Another is from dismissing the unusual suspects of innovation.  Sometimes, the search for innovation benefits from listening to people who are not the usual idea generators, who might look and seem different.

 While an open innovation approach to business sustainability offers stakeholders the opportunity to become engaged in the future of a business, it also recognizes that all  key stakeholders have a vested interest the success of the company, creates openness to new ideas that promote business success.  The trick is engaging employees at all levels of the organization – including the unusual suspects.

 Why is this important?  Consider this on a personal level. No one knows your job like you do.  You have day to day knowledge of potential gains related to suppliers, customers, and productivity.    Once oriented to the corporate CSR vision, sustainability plan, and the sustainable business strategies pursued, (whether that be water, energy, carbon, sustainable supply chain), you as an employee have a lens in which to view current position.  That contrast is the spark for innovation for your specific job and how it fits in the larger context of business operations.  This applies from a janitorial position to the CEO position. 

 The ability to drive new levels of sustainable business performance requires more than executive leadership; it involves engagement at all levels.  As communicated within our business sustainability programs, enabled by the right structure, stakeholder generated innovation can be the company’s greatest asset for change. Limiting organizational structures need to be transformed to support innovative ideas rising to the top.  

Sustainable Business – Custom Bamboo Furniture

Vivi Blog: Earth Friendly Living, Fashion and Fun

The process of opening the store was a painstaking process full of dozens of dead ends, poorly formed ideas and LOTS of researching and planning . I knew I wanted all aspects of the store to be eco-friendly, including the furniture and fixtures. One of the biggest obstacles during this process was finding furniture that not only looked beautiful and was functional but also sustainable and produced as little waste as possible. I spent a long time searching the internet looking at the same products on dozens of different websites. By same I mean particle board and plastic, slat wall, grid wall, gondola, all disposable and all manufactured half way across the world.

Enter Matthew, my awesome fiance (boyfriend at the time) to save the day! 

Matt is an architect and an amazing designer. He designed and built all the furniture and fixtures at Vivi without using a single nail! The material we chose is bamboo plywood, which not only looks beautiful but according to Matt is a great material to work with. He used Formby’s Tung Oil, to stain the wood, an all natural oil that brings out the natural color of the wood. It is water-resistant and provides a durable protective finish. The furniture requires very little maintenance, just a little lemon oil now and then to clean and shine.

Matt spent many days and night gluing and clamping (with Jasmine the family dog).

We used real black bamboo poles and hemp rope for the clothing racks.

I love the finished product, it’s everything the store needed, functional, sustainable, and really beautiful. : )

If you are highly motivated you can take a woodworking class, or would like to get in touch with talented local word workers check out Peter’s Valley in Layton New Jersey.

CGI: Looking for a Partner: Must be Willing to Commit

Put a bunch of executives from different companies in a room to hatch plans, write checks, and plot how to move markets, and it’s a federal crime. Add some foundations, NGOs, and myriad worthy causes, and you’ve got the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI).

The two watchwords of CGI are “partnership” and “commitment,” and those two concepts aren’t far apart. In exploring the main exhibition hall, observing the forums, or simply walking through the halls, one finds an absolutely staggering environment completely focused on collaboration. It’s all about who can do what for whom. It feels like a combination of bustling marketplace, business conference, and tent revival: at any moment a clutch of people might stand up and declare they’re going to “invest $55 million in internet and mobile technologies to advance government transparency and economic empowerment,” as the Omidyar Network and others did.  Although there is in fact tremendous advance planning to each of the many commitments, the feeling of exuberance permeates.

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Five Innovators Heading to CGI: Naya Jeevan, A Doctor’s Rx for Micro Insurance

“Excuse me, do you work with large clusters of marginalized low income populations?”

Some of us arrived a day early for the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) Sixth Annual Meeting. One reason to do that is to attend the CGI Exchange, a robust pre-meeting exhibition event where you can visit with more than eighty amazing NGOs (global nonprofits)!

When I overheard this question being asked of the CEO of an NGO at one booth, I turned to find out who was asking. He was Asher Hasan, M.D., MBA, Founder and CEO, Naya Jeevan (which means “new life” in urdu/hindi). Hasan told me that one of his objectives at CGI is to find partner organizations to serve large groups of low income families in developing countries. Hasan’s mission is to provide families with micro insurance at subsidized rates under a novel national group health insurance model, beginning in Pakistan (underwritten by Allianz-EFU, IGI Insurance, and AsiaCare). Further, he explained that “the lack of affordable access to quality hospitalization, healthcare, and social services is a major source of financial destitution and generational poverty in the emerging world.”

See continuation here…http://bit.ly/9FaEDO