Friday, July 18, 2008
Monday, June 16, 2008
The must-have shopping bag that's green AND fashionable
Contact Shoppingbags.com to order Reusable Bags for your company
Bag lady: Keira Knightley
by SEAN POULTER
It has been seen on the arm of some of the world's most beautiful women - a must-have designer shopping bag that has an official price of £5 yet sells for as much as £400 on eBay.
The "I'm Not a Plastic Bag" cotton and rope creation by Anya Hindmarch(correct) is at the forefront of a battle among retailers to grab the "green" high ground.
Supporters see the bag as the icon of a move against the throwaway plastic bag given away in their billions by supermarkets and other retailers every year.
When the eco bags first went on sale in March, some 500 people queued to buy one at the designer's fashionable Notting Hill store.
The queues will be forming outside Sainsbury's supermarkets, which has gone its hands on 20,000 of the sought-after bags.
It is part of a wider campaign by Sainsbury's to try and shift shoppers to opting for re-usable bags, rather than the conventional plastic carriers.
The bag has become a must-have accessory for the celebrity classes amid the assertion that it combines both designer cache while shouting that the user cares about the planet.
Among the world's most famous women seen toting the bag are Oscar-winning actress Reese Witherspoon, Keira Knightley and Lily Allen.
The editor of US Vanity Fair magazine, Graydon Carter, even used the reusable bag as the goodie bag at his Oscar party earlier this year.
Rather embarrassingly for Marks & Spencer, the model Erin O'Connor, one of the faces of its advertising campaign, has been snapped carrying one of the Sainsbury's bags.
While the agent for another M&S advertising icon, Twiggy, has also been on the phone to Sainsbury's chasing one of the bags for the model.
The supermodels Lily Cole and Ben Grimes-Viort have also been pictured using the bags.
The designer was approached to develop the bag by the We Are What We Do group, which calculates the nation uses 167 plastic carriers per person every year.
The group advocates that small lifestyle changes made by large numbers of people can have a major impact in reducing waste and creation of the carbon, which is blamed for creating global warming.
Archive: New York Times - Leading Manufacturer of Reusable Shopping Bags
nytimes.com/gst/fullpage
Alex Lindsay: Shopping Bag Designer,
By RON ALEXANDER
LEAD: Consider the designer shopping bag. Consider Alex Lindsay. To all intents they're synonymous.
Consider the designer shopping bag. Consider Alex Lindsay. To all intents they're synonymous.
Mr. Lindsay is the founder and owner of ModernArts, a company that creates totes for such retailers and brands as Barneys, Polo, Charivari, Giorgio Armani, Chanel, Gucci, Yves St. Laurent and Paloma Picasso.
His next bag will be for Fahrenheit, Christian Dior's new line of men's toiletries. Clearly, these shopping bags are more chic than schlep.
To his way of thinking shopping bags are worn, rather than carried, as a badge of allegiance to a social group - the one represented by the store. With this in mind, ModernArts weighs decisions about shape, size, paper texture, even materials for handles and the estimated height of the client's customers. Mr. Lindsay feels that packaging ''should reflect the attitude or specific essences of the client.''
Mr. Lindsay, who founded his business in 1968, when he was 25 years old, said that nowadays he finds the work more challenging than ever. ''Good design must startle,'' he said, ''because there is so much more of it around.''
Between bags, he said, he has developed a gold mine in Greece and a construction company in the South. Last year he opened a restaurant, Grappino, in the garment district near the ModernArts offices at 38 West 39th Street. (His first business, which he started while attending Bard College and majoring in philosophy and fine arts, was a restaurant in Poughkeekpsie, N.Y.). He said he also owns ''a couple of little buildings around town.''
''I enjoy my life,'' he said.
Tuesday, March 4, 2008
Forest Stewardship Council
The Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) is an organization that sets forth standards for and monitors environmentally appropriate, socially beneficial, and economically viable management of the world's forests.
Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) Chain of Custody
Chain of Custody (COC) is the path taken by raw materials harvested from an FSC-certified source through processing, manufacturing, distribution and printing until it is a final product ready for sale to the end consumer. The chain-of-custody path for paper products is illustrated below. For an organization to use the FSC logo on their materials, each part of the chain must be FSC certified and meet the standards for compliance.
CLICK TO ENLARGE CHART
Supporting all FSC choices:
FSC Recycled – Buying paper with post consumer content achieves reductions in wood, water and total energy use.
FSC Pure – Choosing paper made with FSC certified virgin fiber protects trees and vegetation that reduce global warming.
FSC Mixed – Papers made with FSC certified mixed sources contain FSC certified virgin fiber along with FSC controlled fiber and/or post consumer content.
Landscape of the Paper Industry
Sustainably Managed Forests
Why?
The U.S. uses 100 million tons of paper a year!
Only 51.5% of paper consumed in the U.S. is recycled.
Post consumer fiber can only be recycled 5 to 7 times.
Trends:
Increased demand for pulp from well-managed forests!
Over 100 million acres of forests certified to FSC Standards…
up from 68 million in 2005.
Renewable Energy
Why?
Producing 1 ton of paper requires 11,137 kWh of electricity.
The average American home uses 26,669 kWh of electricity annually!
Trends:
Manufacturers are investing in…
Process changes
Energy-efficient equipment
Renewable Energy
Sales of Renewable Energy Credits doubled in 2006!
Carbon Footprint
Why?
Rising levels of greenhouse gases and global warming due to…
Expanding economy
Growth of new buildings and transportation
Increasing population
Increase of carbon-based fossil fuels
Decrease in the adsorption of carbon by US forests*
* McKinsey and Company, Reducing US, December 2007
Trends:
Carbon Offset Credits enable businesses and individuals to reduce their carbon footprint.
Between 2005 and 2006, the U.S. carbon offset market grew 200%, now worth $100 Million!
The Green Calculator
Neenah Paper has made it a little easier to save the environment! Using their Green Calculator, manufacturers can calculate how much they are saving the environment by using post consumer recycled fiber, including the environmental savings for using 100% renewable energy.
Go to http://www.neenahpaper.com/ECOPaperCalculator/ and select the first button under 1) then the box under 2) and click the continue button.
Thursday, January 24, 2008
At Whole Foods checkout, no more plastic bags
By Andrew Martin | New York Times
January 23, 2008
NEW YORK - The Whole Foods Market chain said Tuesday that it would stop offering plastic grocery bags, giving customers instead a choice between recycled paper or reusable bags.
A rising number of governments and retailers are banning plastic bags, or discouraging their use, because of concerns about their environmental impact. San Francisco banned plastic bags last year unless they are of a type that breaks down easily. China announced a crackdown on plastic bags a few weeks ago, while other governments, including New York City's, are making sure retailers offer plastic bag recycling.
Whole Foods officials said they had hoped to eliminate plastic bags for some time but had to decide how to make it work in the chain's 270 stores.
A.C. Gallo, the company's co-president and chief operating officer, said Whole Foods tried to get customers to buy reusable bags for several years but "it really never caught on." That changed when the grocery chain began offering reusable bags for 99 cents, he said.
Read Full Article from the Chicago Tribune
