Ecological Intelligence of a Consumer

Get ready to change in the way you think about what is green in the products you buy. Recently on a NPR program, there was a very powerful story about how the ecology of a product’s life cycle will affect the consumers’ buying habits. For example, you like to buy organic products. Let’s say that you have purchased an organic T-Shirt thinking that it’s good for you and the environment. But did you know that organic cotton fibers are shorter than the conventional cotton and thus require more water and land to produce the same amount of cotton for a T-shirt? More and more, the companies are caving into the pressures from consumers that they be more transparent about what chemicals and processes they use to manufacture their products. There is a new site called “goodguide.com” just launched couple of months ago by Dr. Dara O’Rourke, this site aggregates many of these databases to give the consumer a more true ecologically responsible rating for products that we buy. It even offers an Iphone app. so you can make more ecologically sound decisions as you shop.

While you are there check out their link to a book called “Ecological Intelligence” by Daniel Goleman. Here the author gives tons of insightful information on how knowing the hidden impacts of the products we purchase can change everything. Companies spend billions of dollars on market research and analysis on how we buy; on what makes us decide to buy on product over another. By making ourselves more aware of how a product’s life cycle impacts the environment and to our health, we as consumers will become more intelligent and responsible, thus, making the manufacturing companies to change in the same way.

You may say that people will always shop for cheaper products. Yes, but you will have alternative choices and any price point. Basically the competitive nature of these companies wanting your business will offer a change to attract your dollars. This brings a real economical incentive to the marketplace for them to change. What’s really cool about the “goodguide.com” is that, you can make a complaint to these companies and say that you want them to use less harsh chemical to produce their products. What’s really smart about this website is that it won’t send off your complaint right away. It will wait it until it has about 500 complaints for that specific company. Why, because it will them seem more significant and go right to the higher channels of executives rather than the low channels where one or few complaints will be sent. Very smart...