Find a Cause to Go Green

Trying to go green in your office? One of the major roadblocks isn’t finding environmentally-friendly products or working to reduce waste; it is getting others in your office to jump on board.

Sadly, millions of people around the world aren’t that interested in going green. Announcing that your office is “going green” will probably have your co-workers or employees blankly staring at you. Sure, they might try to use less paper for a week or so, but old habits die hard.

There is, however, a way you can get others on board with your efforts: Find a Cause.

Wait…isn’t “the environment” cause enough?

It should be, but people can’t tangibly see the air quality improving in correlation to them writing on both sides of a note card. So, instead, find a local organization that you can help in order to also be helping the environment. Here are a few great ideas:

• Is your local youth group raising money to go on a trip? Put a box to collect empty soda cans in your break room with a picture of the kids. Recycle the cans and donate the money to them for their trip.
• Track how much paper you use in a month’s time. Challenge everyone to save 50% the following month. For every piece of paper they save, donate a dime (or dollar or penny or whatever) to Habitat for Humanity, an organization working to provide green homes to people who need shelter.
• Find a community group running a fundraiser. Ask everyone in your office to consider purchasing a coffee mug – proceeds go to the community group and you’ll no longer be throwing away tons of paper or Styrofoam cups.

Help me come up with some more ideas – how can you use a local cause to help people in your office jump on board with the green idea?