It’s Easy Being Green

As you probably know, Bigelow Tea has been making efforts to make the company more “green”. My family has also taken up the “green” cause. With the high cost of gas and following our personal beliefs, we decided to look into hybrid vehicles. Being a bit of an engineering family we went ahead and compared the vehicles that were available and then our family picked the one that met our needs, a Toyota Prius. That was over a year ago and with the price of gas increasing faster than our savings account it has proven to be a good investment. When you turn the car on, you hear no engine starting. The gauges all light up but the engine does not turn on until the demand is higher than what the battery can supply. It has become somewhat entertaining to see how far we can go without having the engine come on. My eight year old son is always watching to see if Dad can make it to the end of the street without the engine, or can get all the battery charge bars green when heading down the hill by our house.

We are active recyclers at our house as well, sorting out our paper, newspaper, cardboard, metal, glass and plastics. We take our garbage to our disposal station ourselves, so we are very aware of how much trash we produce at all times. My son participates in this activity as well and helps us by placing his “trash” in the appropriate recycle bin. We use fluorescent lights in our house, and our son is slowly getting better at realizing that using lights when not in the room is a waste of electricity and may be contributing to air pollution and global warming depending on your electricity source. We also belong to a program created by our electric company that allows us to specify that our power usage be purchased through renewable sources. It costs us a little more each month, but we believe in putting our money where our mouth is.

Do we do everything we can to conserve, recycle and protect the environment? I am sure we do not, but slowly every year we add on a little more as we can, and more importantly, we talk about it as a family. When my son becomes an adult, the “new” stuff we do will be old hat to him. Our family has made an effort to be green, and so has the Bigelow Tea Company.

Going green doesn’t have to be a “big” thing. It starts small, and can grow as much as you want. Green at home often translates to green at work. We have found talking about it with children, co-workers and friends also helps spread the desire and knowledge about things we can all do to make our world just a little “greener”.

Here’s hoping you can find a way big or small to get “green”. Kermit was wrong after all, “It is easy being green!”

Dean