CSR Minute: Wal-Mart’s Sustainability Consortium Joins IT Corps; Fish2Fork “Green” Seafood Guide

Corporate Social Responsibility News: Wal-Mart’s Sustainability Consortium Joined by IT Corps; Fish2Fork’s Sustainable Seafood Dining Guide.

Kyler by Joy O added as Featured Designer on Sulusso | 3BL Media

(3BLMedia/theCSRfeed) December 21, 2009 – Sulusso, the premier online retailer of sustainable jewelry, announced today that Kyler by Joy O will now be featured on the site.

Kyler is the latest endeavor of San Francisco-based jewelry designer Joy Opfer, whose jewelry is a favorite among celebrities including Anne Hathaway, Cameron Diaz, and Jessica Alba.  

Instead of seeing alternative materials such as recycled stainless steel or reused glass as obstacles, Joy recognized that using these materials she could create more sustainable jewelry alternatives with great designs while using minimal resources. Helping the jewelry and fashion industry to be carbon neutral is indeed one of her motivations.

Kyler is handmade in the United States with recycled and recyclable materials like stainless steel, 14k gold fill, sterling silver, black zinc, and artisan glass, all chosen with our planet in mind.

Kyler by Joy O jewelry starts at just $50. 

About Sulusso

Sulusso, which means “On Luxury” in Italian, is the premier online marketplace dedicated to sustainable jewelry. All of the items featured on the site are crafted by artisans and designers committed to creating fine jewelry with minimal social and environmental impact.

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CSR Minute: 12/8/09 – Bombardier’s CSR Report; Cisco’s Sustainable Cities w/ San Fran and Amsterdam

Corporate Social Responsibility News: Bombardier’s CSR Report; Cisco’s Sustainable Cities’ with San Francisco and Amsterdam

CSR Minute: 12/3/09 – LG’s New CSR-Driven Lab; Bank of Philippine Islands + World Bank’s Energy Project

CSR Minute: LG Electronic’s New CSR-Driven Lab; Bank of the Philippine Islands + World Bank’s Sustainable Energy Finance Project

Behind the Designers Interview Series: Kimarie Designs, fair-trade jewelry pioneer

We caught up with fair-trade jewelry pioneer, Kimarie Burnette of Kimarie Designs to learn more about what inspires her and why she uses fair-trade labor from Bali.

1.  How did you get started in making jewelry?

I traveled to Bali and fell in love with the art and the people.

2.  Sustainability in the jewelry sector is pretty rare, what inspired you to go fair-trade?

My friend told me people were dying refining metal in Indonesia because of the toxic chemicals, we then set about learning how to refine our own metal and establish best practices.

3.  What one thing would you like all jewelry shoppers to know about traditional jewelry?

I’d like people to know that jewelry making in Bali is a centuries old tradition that is handed down from generation to generation. All our jewelry is hand fabricated with a lot of love.

4.  Who are you outside of the founder and designer of Kimarie Designs?

A mom and wife and big fan of sushi.

5.  Who would you be most thrilled to know is wearing your jewelry?

My friends.

6.  What is the experience of working in Bali like?

Working in Bali has been amazing. My goldsmiths now our the kids of my previous set of goldsmiths that are retired and fishing now. It has been wonderful to see them grow up get married and now have to enter “the real world” have a job raise kids etc. My aesthetic and constitution seems to fit Bali like a glove. I love the organic wild and at the same time laid back and very fatalistic tones of their culture. I am able to understand it and work within it very well.

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Nestle Waters’ Hit and Miss

Christine Arena is the author of The High-Purpose Company – The Truly Responsible (and Highly Profitable) Firms that are Changing Business Now. Like what you just read? Get your daily dose of corporate insights. Visit www.christinearena.com for more information.

 

There is a great deal at stake in the bottled water business. Perhaps Nestlé Waters North America knows this better than anybody. The company presently controls approximately 41 percent of the $11.7 billion US bottled water market. Like every other competitor in the space, it faces shrinking category sales, as well as mounting pressure from groups complaining about the toll that water corporations take on the planet.

Bottled water activists point to plastic waste, energy consumption, greenhouse gas emissions, the environmental effects of water extraction, water privatization issues and a range of social problems generated by the industry. Could such “road blocks” deter long-term growth for corporate bottled water empires? Nestlé thinks not.

According to a 2009 document entitled “The Future of Bottled Water” authored by Nestlé CEO Kim Jeffery, the company’s broad portfolio of bottled water products, including Poland Spring, Perrier, Arrowhead, Deer Park and Zephyrhills, are well-positioned to recover from the present economic slump. “Bottled water is perfect as it is,” the company says. “[There are] limited opportunities to innovate.”

This company is clearly not of a world-changing mindset. Nestlé takes the position that the bottled water industry is unfairly portrayed as a “villain” by environmental activists and an angry public, and that “environmental facts do not support this.” Really, Nestlé?

In a press release and video web site launched last week, Nestlé attempted to express to the public the environmental virtues of bottled water. “Bottled water is actually the most efficient choice of any packaged beverage available to consumers,” the company insists. “Bottled water is a very small user of our water resources…Plastic represents less than one percent of solid waste. While water bottles can be recycled, not all Americans have access to curbside recycling…To sum it all up, bottled water is a healthful choice, can cost less than 20 cents per bottle, and has a lighter environmental impact.”

Of course, not everyone sees things through the corporation’s rose colored lens. Take the 5,400 local citizens of Salida, Colorado who recently banded together in order to fight Nestlé off and protect its local water resources and land. Or what about the residents of McCould, California, who claim their town was torn apart by Nestlé’s operations in the area? Nestlé makes no mention of such stakeholder concerns in its press release or video web site, both which set forth to “set the record straight.”

Nestlé has a public relations problem. The problem isn’t just that Americans around the country are hanging signs in their windows and entryways reading: “Stop Nestlé” or “Nest-Leave.” Nestle’s public relations problem is its sterile, detached response. The company seems to be under the impression that people will read its communications in an isolation chamber, devoid of context, clue, cultural condition, and (yes, Nestlé) fact.

Let’s start with the hard data. According to Food and Water Watch, bottled water produces up to 1.5 million tons of plastic waste per year. That plastic requires up to 47 million gallons of oil annually to produce. And while the plastic used to bottle beverages is of high quality and is demand by recyclers, over 80 percent of plastic bottles end up in land fills. That’s why the Pacific Rim Garbage Patch, the floating vortex of waste that’s twice the size of Texas, is comprised mainly of plastic. It’s also why so many sea creatures die every day from ingesting plastic, and why plastic waste has become one of the chief concerns of our Nation’s top environmental groups.

On the cost side of things, consumers pay a huge markup on a product even though as much as 40 percent of it comes from a tap in the first place. Stakeholder communities also pay. Food and Water Watch says Nestlé has an unfortunate reputation for moving into communities, taking water for next to nothing, selling it for a hefty profit, then leaving the locals to deal with the residual environmental and social externalities, and moving on. “Next!”

None of these issues are substantively addressed in Nestlé’s press release or on its video website. Through bullet points, select interviews and clip art snippets, the company only superficially confronts the environmental impacts of bottled water. Nestlé avoids all controversial content, including details related to ongoing rifts with local communities around the country. The company’s corporate tone of voice, detached message and superficial approach to “issues outreach” demonstrates an indifference to the wider public’s ardent support for environmental reform and social justice. The pitch is all wrong.

Nestlé broke every cardinal rule in social media, stakeholder engagement and transparency with it’s one-sided, “set the record straight” public relations effort. There is no meaningful opportunity to interact with the company, no way to leave a comment. My bet is, the only folks convinced by Nestle’s “bottled water is good” message will be those who manufactured it.

Follow Christine on Twitter

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Icestone CEO: “Buy American and Ask Questions” – An Interview with Miranda Magagnini

Today, I visited Miranda Magagnini, Co-CEO of one of New York’s leading ethical companies, IceStone at its headquarters in the Brooklyn Navy Yard. The Brooklyn site, which used to be owned by the U.S. Navy to produce the USS Missouri and other famous war ships, is now home to IceStone, which is waging its own battle for a better world by creating green alternatives to stone surfaces and counter tops. The company, which Miranda runs with Co-CEO Peter Strugatz, produces durable surfaces made of recycled glass and concrete. Their product is not only made from recycled materials but is also recyclable itself. The company has achieved an extraordinary level of certification, including LEED, Cradle to Cradle GOLD, and B Corporation.

Miranda was especially proud of their company’s B Corporation Certification since big companies simply don’t have the ability to be transparent enough to get B Corporation Certified. There are only 190 B Corporations, including Seventh Generation, Good Capital, and Greyston Bakery (listen to our interview with CEO Julius Walls, Jr. here). IceStone’s logo is featured prominently on the B Corporation website. Miranda also showed me a stunning table made from their refined collection (pictured in photo from their website). She also had some cautionary advice for would-be ethical consumers.

“There is a lot of confusion about what ‘eco’ means. ‘Green’ has become something that is in the eye of the beholder. While deep green people ride their bicycles to work, others might feel fine just recycling their paper,” she said. “People have to make compromises because that is what society demands. We all make decisions everyday. There are trade offs.”

Beware of Green Washing

While Miranda was encouraged to see big companies trying to get their minds around sustainability issues and that they are seeing a real business case for the “leaning of products” (or green and lean), she reminded me that it is small businesses that do the innovating. She also warned that some companies are intentionally confusing consumers on green claims. They are “dumbing down” claims on being green. “How many tree frogs do we see on corporate communications? Does it mean anything?”

To avoid falling into these green washing traps, Miranda called on consumers to ask more questions and buy American. Why? Buying products made in the United States helps products that are subject to stricter standards; it employs Americans; it creates jobs; it reduces the U.S. dependence on foreign oil; and it is therefore good for society.

Despite the more stringent labor and environmental standards in the United States, this country has a long way to go in terms of recycling. We are way behind Europe. “And glass has become the orphan of recycling in the United States,” she said. In Europe, 95 percent of glass is recycled and it is sorted so it can be used to create higher value products. IceStone uses post-industrial waste instead of consumer waste because the recycling systems are lacking in the United States. Big U.S. beer companies lobby against increasing the cash return value (container deposit legislation), which would make it worthwhile to sort and recycle glass. The big beer companies simply don’t want to establish the recycling systems to facilitate the more advanced consumer waste recycling, she told me.

But overall, Miranda is upbeat. “I am pathologically optimistic,” she told me. “I have to be as an entrepreneur.”

She sees green products as a permanent presence in the market. “Green is not a trend. It is in people’s vernacular. People want deeper value. Because money is tighter, people ask more questions.” She sees consumers seeking “layers of value,” meaning products must be high quality and the company that produces them must demonstrate that they share your values.

Meanwhile, consumers have a duty to ask questions and find out what is inside those products and what went into making them so they can make informed decisions, which can have a collective impact. It has become cheaper to import quartz from Madagascar or stone from China or Africa, where people routinely die in mines and environmental standards are low, than to source the stone from Vermont. “Every time you see mined or engineered stone,” Miranda urged me, “think IceStone could be used there instead.”

This orginial commentary can be found on Devin Stewart’s blog, Fairer Globalization

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Enter the Sustainable Century – Part 1: A Blog By Chad Tragakis

Strategic communication for business will be critical as President Obama ushers in a new green vision for America and the world

“Let’s be the generation that finally frees America from the tyranny of oil. We can harness homegrown, alternative fuels like ethanol and spur the production of more fuel-efficient cars. We can set up a system for capping greenhouse gases. We can turn this crisis of global warming into a moment of opportunity for innovation, and job creation, and an incentive for businesses that will serve as a model for the world.”
— From Barack Obama’s speech announcing his Presidential Bid in Springfield, Illinois, February 10, 2007

From his campaign kick-off more than two-and-a-half years ago right up through his inauguration this past January, the environment and environmental sustainability were central themes and important priorities for candidate Barack Obama.  He’s been in office for only nine months, but President Obama is moving quickly to reframe the environmental debate and reset expectations on the part of many stakeholders.  All this change will have both an immediate and a long-term impact for business.

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(Revised)CSR Minute: October 6, 2009 – Dow Corning’s Green Portfolio; CRO’s Conference; Sulusso’s Sustainable Jewelry

Corporate Social Responsible News: Dow Corning’s Green Innovation Portfolio; CRO’s Summit Conference; Sulusso’s Sustainable Jewelry

Half-empty or Half-full?

Last week, EMC was ranked as #74 out of 500 in the Newsweek Green Rankings.  I received quite a few congratulatory emails, as well as one or two from folks puzzled as to whether this result warranted celebration.

To be honest, I’m not entirely sure what to make of it. I’m glad we’re in the top 100, of course – plenty of people in EMC have been working hard and making progress, and the recognition is well-deserved. But we’re not satisfied with what we’ve accomplished so far – nor should any of us on the list be.

Oh, I get that rankings create competition, and competition raises the bar. And I’m not so disingenuous as to claim that market perception doesn’t influence our environmental programs. We also appreciate the press (see EMC Commended for Leadership in Climate Change Disclosure for Third Consecutive Year, for example).

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