Revive by Green Solutions @ IIDEX/NeoCon '08
Revive: A Green Solutions Program @ IIDEX/NeoCon Canada 2008
I had an opportunity to meet and discover many progressive companies, manufacturers and organizations at this year’s IIDEX/NeoCon, but I can safely say that the folks from Green Solutions were the ones that inspired me the most on the socially responsible front.
Thanks to the eco-loving people at Teknion [more on their green products soon], I had the honour of sitting down with Teknion members, as well as Jim Reid, Steve Seidl and Sherry Prenevost, the passionate team behind Green Solutions and their brilliant Revive program. We spent a good part of the afternoon in Teknion’s magnificent booth, discussing the extensive green efforts of both companies, exchanging stories and recommending good green reads while being videotaped by Sherry of GS. I was also pleased to partake in the Revive draw, selecting the name of the winner of a donation of 5 tons of furniture/product to the charity of their choice in the winner’s name.
So what makes their Revive program so inspiring to me? Green Solutions provides the socially responsible service of taking a corporation’s redundant assets [furniture + IT equipment that is no longer needed but still functional], and redistributes it to deserving and needy organizations, keeping those products out of landfills. 97% of the assets are actually redistributed locally to wherever the donating corporation is based, which of course makes the program even more green by keeping transport emissions down.
According to the Revive video, an astonishing 200 million tons of corporate assets go to landfills each year, which is equal to 12,000,000 truck loads, or even more mind-boggling — enough to fill the Atlanta Olympic Stadium at an alarming rate of every hour, every day, every year! What kills me even more? Over 90% of those discarded products are still perfectly usable and functional.
So yes, I’m excited about the Revive program. It’s a stroke of green genius and long overdue. I encourage any of my readers who work in a corporation to forward the Revive link and brochure to management at your office. I’m willing to bet that they’ve got a a room full of old computers, telephones and furniture pieces that will otherwise end up at the curb and in a landfill. Thankfully there’s no excuse for that anymore, and by just telling the right people at your firm, you can do your part to help.
Revive builds “green bridges” by connecting corporations with needy and deserving causes…
…with the added green bonus of keeping tons of reusable products out of landfills.
