Showing posts with label sustainability. Show all posts
Showing posts with label sustainability. Show all posts

Creating a Sustainable Business Part II - The Environment

A sustainable business needs to take into consideration 3 things - people, profits and the planet.

1. People - the people your business touches including yourself and your family, your employees, your customers and the other people your business supports.

2. Profits - if your business is not making money, you will probably not be able to "sustain" it for very long

3. Planet - the future of which is quite literally in our hands

So, we want to create a sustainable business - affecting the environment as little as possible - but we also want to make things for a living and sell them.

How do we balance this?

Well, I think the very fact that more and more makers are asking these questions is a great thing and of course, doing something is always better than doing nothing.

I try not to use components produced in certain countries in my work (although this is not possible with everything) because their environmental practices and labor wages do not sustain people or the planet.

I try not to use toxic chemicals in my work, but brazing is a toxic activity (only to me and those in my immediate vicinity, often my hubby since this is done in his shop) as well as pouring resin. When I can use nontoxic materials though, I always do - again doing something is better than doing nothing.

I try to use recycled and recyclable packaging materials, but a test tube shipped without bubble wrap is a test tube that is probably not going to arrive in one piece, so I buy the biodegradable bubble wrap (even though my own tests with it haven't been totally successful) and use recyclable newspaper.

And, I use a few energy saving techniques in my studio including temperature control, using CFLs and surge strips so I can turn everything off with the flip of a couple switches - all easy, peasy stuff.

This is not to say everyone else has to do these things (and many people are doing alot more) - some of these things may be a good place to start though if you are thinking about the sustainability of what you do.

Note - we are not seeking perfection - we are just seeking to have the smallest impact on the natural environment with our work.

The planet is the one P in the 3 P's of sustainability where making a huge impact is not a good thing.

If it is possible to use a sustainable or locally produced piece in our work - maybe passing the additional costs, along with the story (see Part I of this series) of that component used in our piece on to our customer so they can feel good about the materials and methods that have gone into their purchase. This can also produce some great opportunities to collaborate with other makers.

Also remember that you have your own story and your own need to earn a sustainable living and you are not doing anyone a favor by being your own slave labor department (working on this one).

(customers really don't need or want - for more than 5 minutes- more mass-produced junk and as makers trying to make a living with a sustainable business we certainly don't want it obscuring the importance of craft and durability)

Walk into a store and ask the salesperson about the material and production of the item you are looking at and you will probably get a blank stare. This is a huge advantage to us as designers and makers.

We can know what goes into our products and we can work to make those materials (components, packaging, shipping) as environmentally friendly as possible.

We cannot be perfect in this and just having a global business creates lots of planetary wear and tear, but in making sustainable environmental practices a priority to us I believe we are sending the energy of our long term commitment to our business out into the world.





<--- Thirsty fine art photo print by abcd images
(so beautiful)

Next Week- Part III Creating a Sustainable Business - Aesthetics

Creating a Sustainable Business - Part I - The Emotional Connection

I want to kick off this series of posts on creating a sustainable handmade business by focusing on things other than ways of production, production materials, etc.

Now, these are important things and these are the things that are getting alot of attention these days,

(and I am very glad for that)

but there is a bigger picture and a more complex aspect to sustainability that we can capitalize on as makers with a desire to create sustainable work.

When we were kids my sister had a teddy bear who went everywhere with her for years.

(what ever happened to Timmy, sis?)

Parents know that if their children have too many toys and a constant influx of "new stuff" into their lives that they never really get attached to any one special thing for more than a nanosecond.

I think the same is true for all of us.

As a maker trying to create a sustainable business in a disposable world how can I make my work more sustainable by helping my customers develop an emotional attachment to my stuff?

What is the point of using durable materials, recycling, using environmentally friendly production, fair trade, etc if the buyer doesn't connect with the product in a way that creates a long, useful life for our stuff?

Big brands spend big bucks to do this with their advertising campaigns. A clear identity can create an emotional connection for a product and a hefty price tag doesn't hurt (cheap stuff definitely gets tossed easier than the stuff we have saved our pennies to purchase).

The good news for the handmade movement is that we do not need a big bucks advertising campaign to connect with our customer and connect them to our work in a huge and personal way. There are as many ways to do this as there are makers with imagination out there.

1. Create a story for our work that allows the customer to connect to it in a unique way.

Example - BOB - Bunch of Bolts This cool little necklace comes in different colors and different names - nude BOB is pictured here

(it may be time to get the kids out of the room, folks)

BOB comes with an awesome little guide to 'his-story' which includes the following:

"...shortly after cave men discovered them, early man began using BOBs in cave-drawing advertisements for new flint tools and Dino Dung products (for which they were paid very little - since, of course, they didn’t move thus limiting their ability to protest)...."

I think it's genius (plus the maker/designer is my brother). He creates the most amazing connection with his customers who continue to update him on BOB's adventures once they get to their new homes.

2. Tell the story about ourselves, our processes and our materials and include this with our work -

How wonderful would it be to get a beautiful handmade sweater in the mail (like this gorgeous work by ileaiye) with some information about the maker and how this amazing work came to be - maybe even some tracking information on the wool, etc that went into the piece.

A real history of the item (not to support its eco-footprint although that would be great, too) but just to allow the buyer to connect to the work in a stronger, more personal way.

If I bought a sweater made from alpaca and it came with a picture of the actual alpaca, I would be blown away. I would never want to take that sweater off!

3. Use social media to allow your buyers to get to know you and your work in a more personal way

(yes, this means you probably need a blog and you need to update it once in a while and yes, this is work and sometimes alot of work and something that we are all struggling with as our businesses and our lives get busier and busier)


Giving your buyers and potential buyers a peek into your world can definitely create a more emotional attachment to your work.

(of course, it kind of goes without saying- but maybe I should say it anyway, that if our work falls apart right away when used then none of these things will work)

As we seek to create a sustainable business (on so many levels) - giving our customers the tools they need to attach to our products and connect with the maker of our products is a win-win for everyone!

(and yes, this goes against the current business model of creating things with a short life span that get tossed so that the consumer needs and buys more things and it brings us back to the more traditional model of creating work of quality and this is totally a good and necessary thing for our planet and all of us)

Next week - Creating a Sustainable Business Part II - The Environment



nemo the bear by knitting dreams->

Social Responsibility for Java Lovers this V-Day


More than 150 million people in the U.S. drink at least 1 cup of coffee a day. This represents a huge opportunity to have an environmental impact. If you are a coffee drinker- what can you do? 1. Make your own coffee at home - keep that throwaway cup out of the landfill, save the energy that we call money that is in your wallet and have some control over where the coffee you are purchasing with that energy and putting into your body comes from - buy beans with the rainforest alliance seal of approval and avoid supermarket brands with poor environmental records. 2. If you are an addict of Starbucks or your local coffee shop - don't forget your travel mug! And learn more about the business practices of the places you patronize. Is Dunkin Donuts still using styrofoam coffee cups and Nestle genetically engineered coffee beans?