Seems I have been green longer than I care to admit.  Ever since I was a kid, like 40, there I said it, years ago.  My mom is from Germany and they have always recycled and reused as part of their culture for years before we showed up. 

We never wasted anything, brown grocery bags, they were our trash bag, when they changed to the plastic kind, ditto. If we ever got food in those plastic containers, we reused them to save leftovers.  We always found at least a second use for everything.  Thanks Mom, who knew you were so cool??

We had those grocery bags that you took to the grocery store way back when.  However, when I went to the grocery store we would never use them back then, they weren't so cool.  None of my friends did it , you know what I am talking about.  Now it is the THE thing.

Fast forward to today, I am the recycle police in my office.  Actually, I am pretty obnoxious about it and making sure others follow the green rules as well.  Living in Montgomery County Maryland, it is pretty easy to recycle.  They provide residents with recycle bins for paper and plastic and we have free pick up once a week. 

I was showing a condo in a high rise in Bethesda and there was a representative from the county speaking to the building manager.  He was telling, actually insisting, the manager that they need to have the paper recycle bin next to the mailbox area in the lobby so the residence could automatically throw away their junk mail/paper right there in the lobby. 

If you are a business in Montgomery County, MD it is mandatory that you have recycle bins for paper and plastic.  I swear I will pull regular paper I find in the trash can and put it in the bin.  My assistant thinks I am a nut.  Too bad, I have my convictions.

I was looking for a marketing idea for a "Pop by".  If you are a Buffini student you will know what a pop by is. For those of you who are not, a pop by is when you have an item of value to drop off to your past client.  One day I had an "Aha Moment" for a great pop by idea and it was a very green one that I thought I would share with you.

I was in Whole Foodsand they had the reusable grocery bags.  You know the ones I wouldn't be caught dead with when I was younger?  Well there they were, .99cents each.  I bought 150 of them for my pop bys. 

So what I did was group the bags in twos and made a postcard that said the bags were from me. I tied them together with a ribbon with the note that said they were a way to pay it forward to our Mother Earth.  Then drove around to my past clients homes and dropped them off.  Some of my folks were home and it was fun to see them too.

I will tell you that I got the most calls and emails from those bags.  I still need to do another run to more of my clients and will because I had such a great response from the bags.

The good news is that you spend some green and everyone is happy to help Mother Earth breath a little easier.