Update Your Fax and Save Paper

E-mail and scanners have all but made the fax machine a thing of the past, but most offices can’t quite give them up yet. The good news is there are now Online Faxes that allow you all the convenience of a fax machine, but use less paper, and offer other benefits:

• Lower Cost
• More Efficient Use of Time
• More Reliable
• Environmentally Responsible
• Security

How it works:

Sending: When sending faxes, you log in to the fax website and upload the document. If the document is already a file on your hard drive, you simply upload it like an e-mail attachment. If you only have a hard copy, you’ll need to scan it, save it, then upload it. On the receiving end, the recipient will get a paper hard copy, just like you had sent it via traditional fax (unless they too have an online fax).

Receiving: When receiving incoming faxes, rather than a paper print out, you get an e-mail with an attachment. If you need to print it you can, otherwise you can just save it to the appropriate folder on your hard drive.

All those unwanted faxes, just hit delete – no need to save them to your desktop, waste paper. Need another reason? Most spam fax comes through whether you want it to or not, that means it gets printed, and you have to pay for the paper.

Collect Your Bottle Caps- Aveda is Recycling Them!

Aveda now has a cap program that will recycle bottle caps, a material that has been in the past un-recycleable. They will accept all screw caps that are hard plastic, usually the #5 in the recycle arrows located on the inside of the cap. This includes twist tops on bottles, flip tops from tube or food products and other screw like-type rigid lids. Please don’t send them any flexible or soft lids on tubs. For more details on the type of caps and where to send them, contact Aveda directly at capcollection@aveda.com.

One more material that we can keep out of the landfill!

2010 Consumer Trends Forecast- the SHEconomy

The Fresh Ideas Group, a communications company based in Boulder, just launched their 2010 Consumer Trends Forecast. They are calling it the new SHEconomy focusing on the impact of women in the green marketplace. Interesting thoughts on green trends for 2010.

Make One New Green Committment for your New Year Resolution

It’s true for all of us. We all want to be more green but each step requires us to do something differently which is not always easy. If we each committed to just one new thing for the year, we would make a powerful difference as a collective in our nation.

We will have more success with our commitments if we are as specific as we can be to the action and behavior we would like to change. Instead of committing to just purchasing less, make a firm dollar commitment.  Based on what you usually spend on ‘luxury’ or ‘disposable’ items, make a dollar commitment to spend only $200 for the year, or whatever amount makes sense for you and your family. Then, determine how you are going to track your commitment and have some way to measure it. With the example of purchasing less, you would know by the amount of money you spend.

This year,  I have committed to driving less and my goal is to reduce my usual 12,000 miles per year down to 9,000 miles for the year. Although that doesn’t seem to be a lot, that is essentially not driving my car 3 months out of the entire year! My plan is to use a combination of alternative transportation methods such as my bike, the bus and try to carpool more often. How will I know if I am successful? Well, I will track my miles monthly and the goal is to reduce each month by 250 miles. I’ll keep you posted on my progress during the year.

Again,  make your new resolution a specific action and determine the way you will track it. When you do this, the likelihood of success will go up dramatically.

Share with me what your green commitment will be for the year.