Jamie Rector/Bloomberg News

Yesterday a federal appeals court ruled that the lower court judge giving the thumbs up to the merger had in adequately considered the impact the merger would have on consumers. The three-member panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, voted 2-1 that lower court judge, Paul L. Friedman, had rushed a decision in the original hearing. The court ruled that $565 million merger would limit competition and therefore elevate prices for natural and organic foods whereas Whole Foods executives have argued that the merger was necessary in order for the company to compete against much larger competitors like WalMart, Kroger, and Safeway that now sell a large assortment of organic products for consumers.

It is now unclear what will happen if courts determine the merger to be unlawful. Austin, TX-based Whole Foods has already transitioned 27 former Wild Oats stores into Whole Foods stores since the favorable ruling last August. Apparently, the new case has proven to be more than just a legal conundrum for Whole Foods as “documents filed by the Federal Trade Commission revealed that Whole Foods’ chief executive and founder, John P.Mackey, had, under a pseudonym, posted hundreds of messages on financial bulletin boards promoting the company’s stock and criticizing Wild Oats.” (NYT article)

So the real question – will Boise get the 54,000 sq. ft. store we’ve been promised? Whole Foods New Stores List
Also, check out the conversation on SeekingAlpha “Whole Foods: How Many Health Nuts in Boise?”

Brandweek got together with Frito-Lay vp-marketing Gannon Jones about the recent success of a previously less-than stellar (pun intended) product – Sun Chips. Sales for Sun Chips are up 17.6%, or $201.8 million for the 52 weeks ending June 15.

Back in 2006, when Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth came out, (can you believe it has only been two years?!), Mr. Jones says he and his colleagues really began thinking about how to connect Sun Chips with the environment and people’s health. The brand began offering 18 grams of whole grain, low sodium, no trans-fat and installed solar panels at their production plant in Modesto, CA.

What has really made it work for Sun Chips?

As we’ve said before, any company that wants going green to be a profitable, positive, lasting experience needs to make being green a part of daily operations. In this interview Gannon Jones speaks to that same point –

“One thing also learned about green brands and believe very much is that the brands that are most successful in speaking about green make it core to their business strategy. It’s not something you can treat as a consumer promotion and do it for three months and move to the next promotion. Like Prius and Stonyfield Farms who make it core to brand operations, that’s something we believed in. We needed to take a series of steps.”

More on Green Strategies for Business?

Do we Need to Hire an Energy Management Person?

How to Take Your Business Green – Green Strategy

and much, much more you might even read how a PA-based paper company has gone green in Dunder Mifflin Goes Green

image from Reuters UK article online 

Today Wal-Mart announced that it has increased the amount of food it purchases locally by 50% in the last two years. The mammoth retailer has plans to increase that number even further in the coming years at a double-digit rate. According to an article in the Reuters UK, Wal-Mart expects to source about $400 million in locally grown fruits and vegetables from farmers across the United States this year.

“When we’re buying local, there are less trucks on the road, less miles that that produce is traveling and therefore less fuel,” said Pam Kohn, Wal-Mart’s general merchandise manager for grocery.”

How does Wal-Mart define “local”?

“Wal-Mart defines “local” as buying from farmers in a state and selling the produce at stores in the same state.”

Sounds like a fair enough definition.

Why does Wal-Mart want to source locally?

The grocery side of Wal-Mart accounted for 41% percent of sales last year for the world’s largest retailer, but rising transportation costs are straining profitability. In the face of the seemingly never-ending increase of energy costs, Wal-Mart is hoping to reduce the transportation costs to retain the profitability of its grocery business.

Wal-Mart says that during the summer months locally sourced fruits and vegetables make up approx. one-fifth of the produce available in Wal-Mart stores. In the United States, Wal-Mart believes that produce travels an average of 1,500 miles from farms to consumers’ homes. By sourcing locally, Wal-Mart hopes to eliminate millions of “food miles” and says that it has already saved 672,000 miles and 112,000 gallons of diesel fuel by sourcing peaches from 18 states rather than just two.

Last year 10 retailers joined with the U.S. EPA to launch an eco-friendly program dubbed the GreenChill Advanced Refrigeration Partnership. According to our Dec. 10 post about the program,

“Refrigeration consumes massive amounts of energy for retailers and brands and the writer of the article on Greenbiz.com wrote that “someone once told me that Wal-Mart’s second-biggest cost (after people) is energy, and that its biggest energy cost is refrigeration.”

Today the Green Chill program membership has nearly tripled to 28 members that have saved approx. $13 million in operating costs and avoided some 2.5 million metric tons of carbon dioxide from being emitted. Upon joining, members must “determine a baseline measurement of corporate-wide refrigerant emissions from 2007 and embark on a reduction plan this year.” Nineteen of the Green Chill program members are supermarket chains that are reducing emissions by preventing leakage by improving equipment tightness at install and retrofit. The Partnership is also helping many of the retailers take a look at converting to new equipment that uses advanced refrigeration technologies.

The growth of the eco-friendly program is amazing. When the U.S. EPA launched the The Green Chill Partnership late last November it had hopes of taking one million metric tons of carbon dioxide out of the air, the equivalent of taking 800,000 automobiles off the road every year. Well, according to these numbers, the less than one-year old partnership has already taken the emissions equivalent of 2 million cars off the road.

Sattler Eco & Fair Labor Clothing  

http://www.sattlerclothing.com 

                                   
In late February of this year we talked about a new Coca-Cola marketing campaign that seemed to take some liberties with the definition of the term “sustainable”. Read it here. However, according to a recent article in Time Magazine, the mammoth beverage producer announced plans to become “water neutral”. What does that mean? From the Times –

“Coca-Cola sells 1.5 billion beverages a day in over 200 countries, and it takes about 2.5 liters of water to produce just one liter of its products at Coke’s bottling plants. In 2006 Coca-Cola and its bottlers used 80 billion gallons (290 billion liters) of water to produce its beverages — equivalent to one-fifth of the daily water usage of the U.S. Some 40% of that went into drinks like Coke, Sprite and Fanta. The other 60% was consumed by the firm’s supply chain and in the production of ingredients, including the water-intensive process of growing sugar and corn for corn syrup.”

That’s a lot of water.
Jeff Seabright, VP of environment and water resources at Coca-Cola, says this huge consumption of water is the reason Coca-Cola is involved in water programs.

“It’s great that companies used to hand out checks for scholarships or to clean up litter,” says Seabright, “but increasingly the real relevance is using the company’s core competence to address issues that are of societal concern.” That is why Coke announced a program last year to team up with the WWF to preserve seven of the world’s major rivers.

The Times article continues –

“But Coke’s water-conservation efforts go beyond altruism. It’s trying to protect its brand and ensure the availability of a crucial ingredient. By 2025, two-thirds of the global population will face water shortages due to climate change, urbanization and population growth, according to a recent JP Morgan report.”

Coke’s China facilities are on the cutting edge of water conservation since 20% of the world’s population lives there with access to only 7% of the world’s water so 300 million some odd people live in water-scarce areas. According to company reports, between 2004 and 2007 Coke’s 37 bottling plants in China reduced water consumption by 27%.

Sattler Eco & Fair Labor Clothing

http://www.sattlerclothing.com 

Back in March of this year we identified GE as a leader in the Green Business Movement. Based on recently released reports their ecomagination initiative is more successful than anticipated - and not by just a little bit. So how actually is GE’s Ecomagination initiative doing?

According to Sustainable Life Media, “Revenues from the Ecomagination portfolio have crossed $14 billion, according to GE’s third-annual report on the initiative, released today. With revenues likely to pass $20 billion by 2009 – a year ahead of schedule – GE says it is raising its revenue goal to $25 billion by 2010. (Expect this target to be revised again; GE claims it has $70 billion worth of Ecomagination orders currently on the books.)”

GE is also going to use products from its portfolio of Ecomagination products to help achieve its own sustainability goals. GE is reportedly ahead of schedule to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 30% this year and improve energy efficiency 30% by the end of 2012.

According to GE Chairman and CEO Jeff Immelt, “Ecomagination is one of the most successful cross-company business initiatives in our recent history. It is a clear amplifier of our strong reputation for innovation and execution, harnessing the strength of every GE business to maximize returns for GE investors while minimizing our own energy use and greenhouse gas emissions.”

What is Together?

Launched in the U.K. in 2007, Together is a partnership made of companies like Timberland, Target, and Nestle teamed up with nonprofits, and U.S. cities like Seattle, Miami, and Las Vegas. The objective is to help consumers find practical ways of adopting a green lifestyle to reduce their energy consumption. All of the campaign partners have agreed to promote only products or services that demonstrate measurable energy savings. The Togetherizer, that was launched just one day ago, is designed to show how the Together campaign is reducing carbon emissions, as verified by Environmental Resources Management much.

Sattler Eco & Fair Labor

http://www.sattlerclothing.com 

In today’s fluctuating energy marketplace more and more companies are finding competitive advantage by being proactive with energy management. Smart Papers, a 115-year-old paper maker, recently broke ground on a 40-megawatt, $30 million cellulosic biomass energy production facility. The new high-efficiency co-generation power plant is slated to be completed by spring of 2009 and so by the end of the year all brands will be made using renewable energy created at the biomass facility. The biomass will consist mainly of yard waste as well as industrial wood and fiber waste.

Why would Smart Papers do this?

“This move to carbon-neutral production is the centerpiece of our environmental and energy strategies. It enables us to have a future that is completely independent of volatile energy markets,” said Dan Maheu, President and COO of SMART Papers. “We will reduce production costs, make carbon-neutral papers and greatly reduce our greenhouse gas emissions. We will also be a positive contributor to the green power needs of Ohio and the Midwest.”

Mars Snackfood, the makers of Snickers, also recently began powering Texas based candy production with energy created from a Waco, Texas landfill. The project is part of the EPA’s Landfill Methane Outreach Program, a voluntary partnership program aimed at encouraging the recovery and use of landfill gas as a renewable energy source.

Why would Mars do this?

The EPA estimates that this will save Mars about $600,000 a year in energy costs and cut methane emissions equivalent to more than 10,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide since methane is 20x more effective then carbon dioxide at trapping heat in the atmosphere.  

Who else is taking this kind of energy management approach?

Frito-Lay’s Sunchips

The chip factory in Modesto, CA recently installed a five-acre solar field to power its manufacturing facilities. The total 192 solar collectors amount to 54,000 square feet of concave mirrors to capture the sunlight.

REI

In order to meet their objective to be completely carbon neutral by 2020, REI is putting solar electric technology on 11 of its stores this year. The company estimates that the technology will produce approx. 1.1 million kilowatt hours of electricity each year, or about 35% of each store’s energy needs.

“This investment in solar technology will deliver both financial and environmental benefits, helping to contribute to the long-term  strength of the co-op and support our goal to reduce our carbon footprint,” says Brian Unmacht, REI’s executive vice president of Sales, Service, Store Development and Logistics.

With energy becoming an unpredictable factor in the business equation, more companies are trying to hedge their risk by engaging in efforts to minimize their exposure to expensive, non-green energy sources. As Will Sarni, Sustainable Life Media Advisor wrote, “The fact is, energy and carbon management may soon become a core competency for business, just as environmental, health, and safety was brought “in-house” once companies recognized these competencies as critical for successful business operations.”

Sattler Eco & Fair Labor Clothing

http:www.sattlerclothing.com 

Every month META hosts a “Beyond the Bottom Line” workshop on current business topics. This month the topic is “Greening Your Business” and Sattler Eco-Clothing founder Dave Sattler will be out there with Idaho Green Expo Vice-President and Sustainable Growth owner Lindsay Schramm to present on that topic.

Who is META?

META (MicroEnterprise Training & Assistance) provides business growth strategies in the form of technical assistance, microloans, business plan training to eligible women, minorities, immigrants, and other underserved populations for the purposes of starting or developing their Idaho-based business.

I figured since I was preparing some materials to present on this topic anyway I might as well post it here.

To begin, let’s try to get a grasp exactly what we are talking about - in a business perspective. A report recently published by the conservative Ernst & Young titled “Strategic Business Risks of 2008” read –

“A specialist in science and international affairs wrote, “Current climate predictions are based on models and, naturally, the scenarios communicated to the policy world are the scientifically conservative scenarios (i.e., those which most scientists agree are likely). Yet scientifically conservative scenarios are not necessarily what will happen; it is possible that the hazard is actually more imminent than is commonly understood. In this case, we may see physical climate surprises as well as an increased policy response that is more abrupt than most firms are currently planning for.”

Even with conservative forecasts of climate changes the reality is imminent and merits immediate attention. If you live in CA or FL, that is why your governors are trying to work together to protect their coastlines from being underwater. (See Video) One of the most important things to realize about taking your business green is that, just like anything else, if you drag your feet and “go green” because everyone else is and your boss wants to know your “green strategy” by the end of the week then it will be most likely result in an expensive, frustrating failure.

Michael Porter, the same guy from Harvard that gave us the 5 Forces model, wrote a must-read article on the topic of integrating Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), in this case – being eco-responsible - into the operations of a business. Of this likelihood for failure he wrote –

“The fact is, the prevailing approaches to CSR are so fragmented and so disconnected from business and strategy as to obscure many of the greatest opportunities for companies to benefit society. If, instead, corporations were to analyze their prospects for social responsibility using the same frameworks that guide their core business choices, they would discover that CSR can be much more than a cost, a constraint, or a charitable deed – it can be a source of opportunity, innovation, and competitive advantage.”

Essentially, half-hearted efforts don’t work. Your industry or business has a unique value chain for which there may not be a model to follow when greening your business – if you have no model to duplicate and you are not fully vested in going green then it will be a struggle for you to find the motivation to identify opportunities to reduce your impact on the environment.

We’ll post more on this topic later but we wanted to provide some excellent resources for anyone considering taking their business green so we have listed some of our favorite resources on the subject.

My Top Resources for Taking Your Business Green –

Pew Center on Global Climate Change; Getting Ahead of the Curve: Corporate Strategies that Address Climate Change

HBR – The Link Between Competitive Advantage and Corporate Social Responsibility. Michael E. Porter and Mark R. Kramer

KPMG - Climate Change Risk Report

Strategic Business Risks of 2008 – Ernst & Young – Radical Greening

Green Consumer Segments

Nielsen: More Than Half of U.S. Consumers Would Give up ‘Convenience Packaging’ to Help Environment

Interesting HBR Article “Don’t Bother with the “Green” Consumer”

Green Marketing Tips for Eco Entrepreneurs in 2008

Green Energy / Operations – Dell Gets Green Energy

GE – Greening Current Needs with OLEDS

The 4 Green Fashion Consumers – Which One for You?

John Davies – “How to Identify Sustainability Strategies That Deliver: Plucking Low-hanging Fruit Green Initiatives” Webinar

Up to 75% of a company’s carbon footprint comes from transportation and logistics

Harris Interactive – Corporate America’s View on “Going Green”

Environmental Leader

I’ve always liked Dell - never had any problems with them. This post was written on a Dell. According to an article in GreenBiz, as of April 3^rd, Dell’s 2.1 million square foot headquarters in Austin, Texas are now powered completely from eco-friendly wind and landfill gas sources. The eco-friendly move is a big step in Dell’s goal of achieving carbon neutrality at its owned and leased facilities by the end of this year. Approximately 40% of the power will be supplied from the Waste Management Austin Community Landfill gas-to-energy facility while the remainder will be sourced from existing wind farms in the state through TXU Energy.

The eco-friendly energy contract is slated to provide the computer-maker with a little more than 80 million kilowatt hours per year for the company’s headquarters. In its effort to be more eco-friendly, Dell has already saved approx. $2 million a year retrofitting its facilities with power management systems and replacing inefficient lighting and air conditioners.

As far as Dells other locations - Here in beautiful Idaho, the Dell facility in Twin Falls is powered completely by wind and solar power while the company’s Austin Parmer Campus is increasing its green power from 8 to 17 percent.

This comes almost a year after Dell launched its “Plant a Tree for Me” campaign. The eco-friendly initiative essentially gives consumers the option of selecting “Plant A Tree for Me” when configuring their purchase to offset the carbon emission resulting from the production of electricity required to power their systems. Of the program Michael Dell said, “We’re the first global technology company to offset emissions with the purchase of their computers.” The program is done in partnership with The Conservation Fund and Carbonfund.org and 100% of the donated funds go to facilitate the planting of trees.

Eco-Friendly & Fair Labor Clothing
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