Greening Your Small Business
How to Improve Your Bottom Line, Grow Your Brand, Satisfy Your Customers - and Save the Planet
By: Jennifer Kaplan
Published: November 3, 2009
Format: Paperback, 320 pages
ISBN 9780735204461
Publisher: Prentice Hall Press
"Like millions of small business owners across America, you're asking yourself whether there is an economic advantage to going green", writes Greenhance LLC partner and green marketing consultant Jennifer Kaplan, in her very practical and action oriented book Greening Your Small Business: How to Improve Your Bottom Line, Grow Your Brand, Satisfy Your Customers - and Save the Planet. The author makes a powerful case that that not only can a small business become more profitable through increased environmental awareness, but also become a role model for other companies and customers seeking a green alternative.
Jennifer Kaplan understands the critical necessity for small business owners to think and behave proactively about the environment. She describes how thinking green is not just some unattainable ideal, but instead is a powerful bottom line profit builder. The author dispels completely the myths that operating a small business in an environmentally friendly manner is expensive and time consuming. Instead, Jennifer Kaplan demonstrates that cost savings from environmental awareness will increase any small business's profitability. The author knows that many of today's consumers are seeking products and services that are ecologically friendly, and those customers want to buy from business owners who are committed to the environment. Going green benefits a company through lower costs, and from higher sales to green conscious consumers.
Jennifer Kaplan (photo left) recognizes that not all small business owners know where to begin a eco-conscious action program. As a result, the book contains an important section on creating a green plan suited to the needs of an individual company's needs and goals. The author provides a very easy to apply outline for creating a green strategy for reducing costs while boosting the bottom line. Through identifying the current environmental strengths and weaknesses of the company, the entrepreneur can discover easy to expand and change activities to a series of workable best practices. As the small business owner begins to think in terms of the environment, expenses like energy use, general office costs, and business travel can be reassessed objectively. At the same time, additional business opportunities for new green oriented products and services can be discovered, by gaining the commitment of the entire staff.
For me, the power of the book is how Jennifer Kaplan guides the small business owner through the entire process of developing a green strategy, and then sharing ideas to put the resulting plan into action. The author does a fine job of demonstrating that becoming a more eco-friendly company is not only the right thing to do, but is also good business. As with so many aspects of ethical business practices, an environmentally ethical business is also good for all stakeholders, including the owner, staff, suppliers, and customers. Jennifer Kaplan shows the entrepreneur how to communicate the green message through improved marketing, reduced packaging and waste, and via more intensive use of the internet. The multitude of tips provided in the book range from small changes to more extensive changes in business practices. The key is that all existing and additional best practices add up to huge savings, and become part of the regular business procedure.
I highly recommend the essential guide book Greening Your Small Business: How to Improve Your Bottom Line, Grow Your Brand, Satisfy Your Customers - and Save the Planet by Jennifer Kaplan, to any small business people seeking to learn how to green their own companies. The book will appeal to both already committed environmentalists, and to business owners seeking to reduce costs and to enhance their company appeal to eco-conscious customers.
Read the business transformational book Greening Your Small Business: How to Improve Your Bottom Line, Grow Your Brand, Satisfy Your Customers - and Save the Planet by Jennifer Kaplan, and turn your independent business into into an eco-friendly company. Not only will you help the environment, but you will reduce your business costs, while reaching more green aware customers. Green business is very good business, in so many ways.
