We have all learned that bubbles in the market make us feel good while they grow, but then become the cause of our economic woes. I discovered another kind of bubbles that seems to have only a positive effect–homemade ginger ale. Champagne can do the same if drunk in moderation (Champagne–the drink divine; A dollar’s worth of bubbles and a dime’s worth of wine). I suspect that ginger ale’s contribution to sustainability is vanishing small, but it sounds like a step in the right direction. The Dining and Wine feature of the New York Times reports this: > At Stand,… Read More
Continue ReadingSustainability by the Numbers
The Greener by Design conference has produced a stream of reportable articles. I plan to post my thoughts on these from time to time. Today, a presentation by Rand Waddoups, senior director of business strategy and sustainability at Wal-Mart popped up to the toop of the pile. Reported by Amie Vaccaro in a post titled, “[A Metrics Driven Approach to Sustainable Business](http://www.greenbiz.com/blog/2009/05/19/a-metrics-driven-approach-sustainable-business),” Waddoups described a system Wal-Mart is using to drive their whole system toward “sustainability.” > [Waddoups] described Wal-Mart’s four part journey to sustainability, beginning with consensus building around need for sustainability, moving into an evangelist phase, and then… Read More
Continue ReadingFear and Trembling in America
I just noticed the the New York Times has started a blog devoted to discussing the impact of the recession on people’s psychic and other parts of their lives. Here’s their own description. > The severe economic downturn has forced many people to reassess their values and the ways they act on them in their daily lives. For some, the pursuit of happiness, sanity, or even survival, has been transformed. > > Happy Days is a discussion about the search for contentment in its many forms — economic, emotional, physical, spiritual — and the stories of those striving to come… Read More
Continue ReadingKnow Thy Audience Before Saying “Global Warming”
Departing a bit from the usual posts, I thought the report I talk about here is so important that it merits special treatment. Given the clamor that always accompanies any “political” conversation about climate change, carefully gathered and analyzed data on public attitudes is invaluable. Much of what goes for survey data is suspect and presented by some group way to one side of the issue or the other. But now we can turn to an extremely carefully executed study of attitudes done by the Yale Project on Climate Change and the George Mason University Center for Climate Change Communication.… Read More
Continue ReadingVenti of Troubles
Starbucks is more than just another corporate headquarters to Seattle. It’s the story of hometown boys make good, even if the real genius of their explosive growth, Howard Schultz, was an import from the East. Now the storybook company is facing grande challenges to its growth and health. [The Seattle Times wonders](http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/jontalton/2009228571_biztaltoncol17.html) if the recession has made a permanent dent in the popularity of Starbucks. Same store sales are down, a very ominous sign in the retail trade. I am a bit surprised by this change. After all, part of the marketing genius of Schultz was to see each Starbucks… Read More
Continue ReadingEcological Intelligence (continued)
Following on the heels of the last post, I found this review of Goleman’s book on the Financial Times. Most of the review follows the line in his interview with Moyers. Sample: > Goleman argues that we can train ourselves to think differently – to develop an innate flight instinct when confronted by, for example, a shampoo that contains methylparaben, or a garden chair made from tropical wood. > > Helping the consumer along the way are new websites which drive “radical transparency”. Skin Deep, a “cosmetic safety database” evaluates the chemical content of more than 50,000 different products and… Read More
Continue ReadingFeeling Good With Goodguide.com
Running through my RSS feed reader tonight, I spotted an entry in [Bill Moyers Journal](http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/index-flash.html) referring to an interview with Daniel Goleman about his new book, *[Ecological Intelligence](http://www.amazon.com/Ecological-Intelligence-Knowing-Impacts-Everything/dp/0385527829)*. I just got a copy of the book from the author as a thank you for a short passage in it, summarizing a conversation we had while he was writing the book. I haven’t yet had a chance to read it, but I draw today’s post from watching the [interview video](http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/05152009/watch2.html). I came away with a mixed impression. With this book, Goleman has done more to publicize the use of life cycle… Read More
Continue ReadingFlourishing in Maine
I need to take a day off from the serious stuff I try to post. My wife and I are settling into our summer routine in Maine. Starting in May, we move gradually up to our cottage in Brunswick, or as the Mainers would say we head downeast. Every spring we hold our breath as we open up, wondering how the place fared over the winter. The mothballs that local folklore says keeps the varmints out seemed to have done their job this year. But we always lift up the blankets to make sure that some family of mice hasn’t… Read More
Continue ReadingMarshmallows and Sustainability
The connection between the two words in the title is a bit tenuous, but it is real. I’ve just finished a great story in the New Yorker about connections between delayed gratification and performance in school and similar milieus. The marshmallow serves as the object used to measure children’s degree of self-control in a psychological test. Children are shown a marshmallow and given the following instructions to choose among: 1. Eat the marshmallow right away. 2. Wait 15 minutes until the examiner returns, at which time they will be given an additional marshmallow. 3. If they can’t wait that long,… Read More
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