July 10, 2009
Another Way for Businesses to be Greener
By: Elaine Levins
While reading the April 2009 issue of "Inside Direct Mail" (yes, I know I'm a few months behind, but we receive a lot of publications - sometimes it takes a while to catch up), I discovered a brilliant idea.
Seven years ago, a woman received an mailing from an environmental company that was promoting the act of reusing envelopes in order to reduce waste. The problem was that this mailing came in a sealed envelope, covered in print and labels... there was no way to reuse it! While some of us might think it simply bad marketing on the part of the environmental company, she saw it as a business opportunity.
And that's how ecoEnvelopes was born. She actually contacted the government-sponsored environmental company that originally sent her the mailing, and got a grant to start her company. She then spent several years researching USPS postal regulations, creating prototypes, etc., until she was able to offer reusable envelopes in a variety of sizes. She even created the first USPS-approved two-way postage indicia, making it even easier for direct marketers to cut costs and waste by eliminating the need for separate postage when reusing envelopes.
This article interested me for several reasons: one, I've stated before that I'm in support of anything to reduce waste and make businesses "greener," and two: as an agency, our clients look to us to help design and implement direct mail campaigns. Any way we can inform ourselves on new ways to save money and stress for our clients is always a plus.
Most of all, it appealed to my sense of invention. You see, I sort of see myself as a frustrated "inventor": I come up with great ideas all the time, only to find out that someone else already has a patent, or that others don't find my idea nearly as amazing as I do. Anyway, the bottom line here is: she saw an opportunity, and she went out and made it happen. I'm sure the beginning years of ecoEnvelopes were not without headaches and difficulty, but the business is now approaching $40 million in sales. Not too shabby.
I applaud anyone who can come up with a solution to a tricky problem. In fact, I challenge everyone who reads this post to look around to see if there's something in your daily life that could use improvement: you never know what you might come up with!
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