10 Ways Your Business Can Go Green in 2020
Plus: How Cherry can help
As 2019 comes to a close & we start making our personal new year resolutions, you may want to consider making improvements to your company by going green. There are plenty of reasons to make the change: from reducing unnecessary waste and costs to attracting and retaining talent. Adopting sustainable practices at work can have a big positive impact on the environment, your workforce and your business. Whatever your motivation may be, there has never been a better or easier time to go green at work. Below are 10 simple ways to get started (or improve your existing sustainability efforts).
- Clean your office using green products that are not damaging to the environment (or toxic to your employees!) Try using baking soda, vinegar and lemon juice. Go a step further and adopt environmentally preferred purchasing policies across departments, choosing products that are non-toxic and either recyclable or biodegradable.
2. Help employees understand their carbon footprint & offset the CO2 emissions from your business by purchasing renewable energy credits or green tags. At Cherry we offset our own carbon footprint with Project Wren:
3. Use energy-efficient lighting. LEDs are a cost-effective alternative to incandescent bulbs (and use slightly less energy than CFLs). Learn more about why you should choose LEDs here.
4. Develop good habits like turning off the lights when leaving a room. Going green doesn’t have to be expensive.
5. Unplug your devices when you’re not using them and avoid energy vampires (devices that continue to use energy and drain power even when not in use). Phone chargers left plugged in continue to drain energy even when no phone is being charged.
6. Collectively, cars and trucks account for nearly one-fifth of all US emissions, emitting around 24 pounds of carbon dioxide and other global-warming gases for every gallon of gas. Create a green commuter program that incentivizes eco-friendly choices like public transportation & biking options. (With Cherry, you can give employees a monthly allowance towards bike-share apps and public transportation to help them make better choices).
7. Offer your employees local, organic snacks.
8. Go paperless wherever possible. Use electronic documents, e-books and cloud storage services. If you do need to print something, print on recycled paper & use both sides. Avoiding printing receipts whenever possible. Paper receipts account for 1.5 billion pounds of environmental waste a year.
9. Skip the plastic. 12.7 million tons of plastic are dumped into our oceans every year. Avoid supplying plastic cups at the office. Instead, equip your kitchen with ceramic mugs and glass cups. When ordering food for the office, ask to skip the plastic utensils. Switch to bar soap instead of liquid soap that comes in plastic bottles.
10. Choose to do business with companies like Cherry 😉. We can help you get started with most items on this list:
#2 Let employees give back to causes they care about as a corporate perk. With Cherry, your team can choose to contribute to Project Wren, Ocean Conservatory, Natural Resources Defense Council, or Cool Earth to name a few
#6 Creating corporate programs that incentivize eco-friendly commuter choices for your team
#7 Creating a choose-your-own-snacks program with organic & local vendor options
#8 If your company has a stipend program — health & wellness, commuter, education, etc. Cherry helps you go paperless by skipping the reimbursement process (no receipt printing necessary)
#9 Most payment cards (debit, credit, gift cards) are made of PVC plastic which is especially difficult to recycle. Cherry is the only perk company to offer 100% virtual debit cards that are eco-friendly and help reduce the amount of plastic waste.
Read more about Cherry’s partnership with Project Wren.
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