It seems everywhere you look these days, someone, somewhere is touting a new "Green" product. One can now buy Organic Cotton sheets, bio-degradeable dog poop bags, overpriced bags for grocery shopping (My $.99 re-use ables from Wegman's suit me just fine thanks!) Even Clorox (of all entities!) has a new line of environmentally friendly cleaning products called Green Works.
While I think this is all well and good, one thing to note is that these are still all products. They still needed to be manufactured and shipped to you. Most come in plastic. You still need to burn gas (and $) going to buy them. I think we sometimes overlook that often the "greenest" thing you can do (regarding stuff anyway) is nothing at all. Sure, if you really need sheets, choose the best ones you can and get organic cotton if you can. But really, keeping the sheets that you have IS the greenest option.
A friend recently told me of her decision to switch over to all natural cleaning products. She would be throwing her old products out, in the trash. In a plastic bottle. Her other option was dumping them down the sink. I think she would be better to just use up what she has and then get new greener stuff because now her old products are polluting the environment and she hasn't even cleaned anything with them. The damage wrought by her products has been completely pointless.
Obviously in the above example, she may be also switching for the health of her household so there is more to the equation than that. But before we go all green with our products lets remember that consumption in general is less green than nothing at all. Use what you have before you decide you need something new!
4 comments:
Ok, the title reminds me of my husband with his "Brown is the new black", "gray is the new black" fashion commentary -- are you spending too much time with him? ;)
Interestingly, I went out last weekend and I bought a plethora of eco-friendly cleaning products. Now, I was out of every one of the items I bought, so I was not wasting the old products, so that's good! I normally don't buy those types of products, because, well, I normally don't do the grocery shopping, but they have always seemed to be a little more expensive than the regular products. But I decided that the little extra cost is worth it in the long run!
He he! Yup! I was thinking of Drew!!!
Cool on the earth friendly products. What kind did you get? At least the Method brand and those Clorox Greenworks products are just a little more expensive than regular products. (and I think the difference is less than $1) Of course you can go more "high end" with the earth friendly products and spend $$$ but you don't have to in order to still feel good about what you are using!
"I think we sometimes overlook that often the "greenest" thing you can do (regarding stuff anyway) is nothing at all."
Rock on! So true.
Yep, I've heard the "green is the new black" tag too! I'm happy to see that clothing designers and designer-wanna-be's are jumping on the eco-fashion train. Now my question is, are the garments truly green?
One of Barney's high fashion designer is on the cusp of trying out a "green" product line, but wants to "test drive" the idea first with Target, where the investment isn't as high.
On the consumer end, I think that when consumers decide to "go green", clothing or in other aspects of our lives, we need to consider if the products we're buying are truly green and if they intend to stay that way.
One young woman who is attempting to start her own clothing line decided that one way to recycle clothing would be to swap with others who are done with it and then embellish it. Not a bad idea, but too bad TTHAT doesn't make the clothing "green"...And when the second owner is done with it an no one will take it off their hands the garment will last on this earth several years after the life of the designer.
This is what I mean about being careful in making sure that the products we purchase are truly green.
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