Take a look at your calendar and you can see that Earth Day is quickly approaching. In the last decade, huge strides have been made in educating and empowering the public to make earth-friendly choices. No longer are just a few companies “green”, now almost all companies have programs in place to reduce their carbon footprint.
Earth Day has been a day to celebrate Mother Nature for over three decades. Earth Day is also a great time to enact a promotional program to show you care about the environment. Eco-friendly products are the current rage. You cannot walk into a grocery store, department store, or even a gas station without seeing an eco-friendly product. Any business can reusable coffee cup stand to benefit from environmentally-friendly products, both with their bottom line and their carbon footprint. But, as with anything, it’s important how you do it.
How do you want to acknowledge your brand? Are you focusing on renewal? Reducing waste? Or Recycling? There is a vast array of eco friendly products for whatever theme you choose.
If your brand is about reducing waste both professionally and personally, Eco-friendly totes are great trade show giveaways, and reduce the number of plastic bags one might use at the mall or grocery store. Plastic bottles are a huge drain on the environment, as they take almost forever to degrade. Why not offer plastic bottles as a promotion? Water bottles are great for fitness centers, schools, or any company wellness program, and come in a wide variety of choices and price points, and some even have built in filters.
If your goal is to reuse, then look for products made from post-consumer waste. You are not relegated to notebooks, as there are post-consumer recycled materials of all sorts, such as the cornball pen. Reusable Coffee Cups and Soda Cans are all of the rage in promo items right now.
Fans of promotional apparel also have a slew of options. There is a large variety of sustainable fabrics, such as organic cotton, recycled polyester, hemp, and bamboo. A clever idea is to reference the green movement as well as your brand.
Going green in promotions is not only the right thing to do, but also a great way to tap into a different and engaged market. Your promotional item will with careful thought be something the recipient will use every day, so your logo will be seen buy a large number of different people. Green friendly products are often in the same price range if not less expensive than traditional promotional items.
However you choose to acknowledge Earth Day, it is important that sustainability efforts be an extension of your brand. Being “green” can be a part of your business identity if you so choose. Consumers respect businesses with eco-friendly practices. People that are committed to healthy and sustainable living are members of one the most loyal and engaged consumer groups.