The Triple Bottom Line Blog

New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman is a big boy--author of several best-selling books and one of America's most influential opinion-shapers about topics like globalization, economic policy, the "war on terror," and the energy crisis. Over the years, his ideas have been subject to plenty of scrutiny and criticism. But I was a bit startled to see his recent column on sustainable energy policy attacked by Daniel Luzer in the respectable Columbia Journalism Review not on the basis of any logical or factual errors but on purely personal grounds:

Friedman . . . is married to Ann Bucksbaum, the heiress to the $2.7 billion General Growth Properties fortune. Founded by Friedman's father-in-law in 1954, GGP is America’s second largest real estate investment trust and owns, develops, and operates regional shopping malls in forty-one states.

That's right, malls. Fat, energy-hogging, climate controlled, sprawl-inducing—many of the most palpable examples of American waste and ecological irresponsibility are owned and managed by Tom Friedman's family.

This makes [Friedman's] gee-why-don't-you-write-your-congressman naivete a little hard to take. Friedman actually has direct access to a company with some control over the level of waste the United States perpetuates on the world.

Is this fair or reasonable? Arguably not. Who knows how much actual influence Tom Friedman wields over the company his father-in-law founded? Nor does Luzer's article offer any information as to whether GGP has taken any steps to move the properties it manages toward greater energy efficiency or eco-responsibility. Apparently, as far as Luzer is concerned, the fact that GGP runs malls is damning in itself--and it thoroughly undermines Friedman's credibility.

This little episode offers an interesting reflection on the place of sustainability in the American dialogue today. Although more and more people now recognize the legitimacy of sustainability issues in the political and business arenas, there is somehow still a need to prove one's bona fides before advancing a sustainability argument--as though, unless you can somehow prove your personal purity, you're likely to be considered a hypocrite just for talking about sustainability. (Remember the attacks on Al Gore for owning a big house and flying around the world by jet.) And as Luzer's column suggests, criticism of your sincerity is just as likely to come from the left (i.e. from environmental advocates) as from the right (i.e. environmental skeptics).

It's funny: Anyone can make an argument on behalf of self-serving, absolute laissez-faire policies ("Down with regulation! Drill in Yellowstone! Pollute at will!") without having their right to make that argument questioned. The assumed sincerity of self-interest insulates the anti-sustainability crowd from this form of criticism. Environmental advocates are held to a higher standard, one that extends not only to their own behavior but even to that of that families.

If you're a CEO working to position your company at the forefront of the sustainable business movement, you should devote a little time to analyzing (and, if necessary, "cleaning up") your personal behavior as well, including the kinds of cars you drive, the houses you own, and the holdings in your retirement account. If your efforts on behalf of sustainability provoke resistance or resentment from any quarters, you can be sure all those purely personal matters will come under scrutiny--fair and reasonable or not.

If it can happen to Tom Friedman, it can happen to you.

Labels: Ann Bucksbaum, C-Suite, Daniel Luzer, GGP, malls, Personal Musings, Thomas Friedman

We've given Wal-Mart a fair amount of credit for some of the smart sustainable business moves they've made in recent months--for example, see what we wrote here, here, and here. Thanks to the favorable coverage Wal-Mart has (deservedly) received for some of its current initiatives, the company's bad reputation among citizen stakeholder groups has begun to dissipate.

On the other hand, it won't take too many stories like this one to undo all the good from a year's worth of well-meaning environmental and social efforts:

Wal-Mart Stores Inc. is mobilizing its store managers and department supervisors around the country to warn that if Democrats win power in November, they'll likely change federal law to make it easier for workers to unionize companies--including Wal-Mart.

In recent weeks, thousands of Wal-Mart store managers and department heads have been summoned to mandatory meetings at which the retailer stresses the downside for workers if stores were to be unionized. . . .

Wal-Mart may be walking a fine legal line by holding meetings with its store department heads that link politics with a strong antiunion message. Federal election rules permit companies to advocate for specific political candidates to its executives, stockholders and salaried managers, but not to hourly employees. While store managers are on salary, department supervisors are hourly workers.

Not only is this terrible public relations for Wal-Mart, it's a very clumsy way of trying to influence the political climate regarding labor. In the words of Daniel Gross, the Slate magazine commentator on business and economics, "Wal-Mart may be a master of many domains: global supply chains and logistics, local politics and zoning, anti-union warfare and branding. But on the stage of national politics, it has proved to be strikingly inept."

For one thing, why shift your political spending from overwhelmingly Republican to half-Democratic--as Wal-Mart has done in recent years--and then get caught awkwardly trying to torpedo Democratic electoral chances? If your goal is to make friends on both sides of the aisle (a wise strategy, especially during a period of political volatility), this is no way to go about it.

Gross goes on to point out that, in any case, Wal-Mart's assumption that having a Democrat in the White House would be bad for business is quite possibly wrong:

Despite Clinton's Arkansas roots, most Wal-Mart executives probably opposed Clinton in both his successful campaigns. But during his presidency, Wal-Mart's stock more than tripled. By contrast, Wal-Mart executives polled in 2000 would have been exultant at the prospect of two George W. Bush terms, especially if they were to be coupled with mostly Republican control of the House and Senate. And yet this decade has been a lost one for Wal-Mart shareholders: In the Bush years, the stock hasn't budged at all.

Yes, politics matters. But in the end, the macroeconomic climate matters a lot more. Wal-Mart's success ultimately depends on whether the lower-income and middle-income customers on whom it depends are doing well or getting eaten up by stagnant incomes and rising costs for health care and gas.

As Talleyrand once said, Wal-Mart's ham-handed political manuevering is worse than a crime--it's a blunder.

Lesson for business leaders: If you're going to get involved in politics, better rely on a team of people with shrewd political instincts and know-how. Otherwise you may end up doing yourself more harm than good.

Labels: politics, Role of Government, unionization, Wal-Mart

Because I worked with Jimmy Carter on three of his books (a decade or more ago), I am on the Carter Center's mailing list for periodic reports about the ex-president's overseas travels. They tend to be a little more interesting than my family slide shows from Disney World, since they deal with things like peace negotiations, monitoring elections, and trying to wipe out infectious diseases in Africa. I guess everyone has a different idea of fun.

The latest report I received is from a trip to the Arctic that Jimmy and Rosalynn took in July aboard the Endeavor, a National Geographic ship operated by Lindblad Explorations. The passenger list was rather unusual. Carter writes:

Participants included Madeleine Albright, Tom Daschle, Chevy Chase, Larry Brilliant and Larry Page from Google, CEO of National Geographic John Fahey, Director of the Centers for Disease Control Julie Gerberding, CEO of Monsanto Hugh Grant, CEO of DuPont Chad Holliday, CEO of Aspen Institute Walter Isaacson, Governor of Colorado Bill Ritter, eBay CEO Meg Whitman, and President of Lindblad Explorations Sven Lindblad.

If you're like me, you don't know most of these people personally, but the list certainly includes some folks I think of as "good guys" and some as "not so good." (I recently saw an advance copy of a film about the industrialization of agriculture that depicts the behavior of Monsanto in the most dire terms imaginable--more on this as the movie gets closer to its release.) Of course, President Carter brought Yasir Arafat and Menachem Begin to the same conference table, so I guess he is used to being in the same room with people whose goals and motives are (to the say the least) divergent.

The entire trip focused on environmental issues. Carter spoke "regarding my experience as president dealing with an inherited energy crisis (reduced oil imports from 8.6 million barrels/day to 4.3 million/day--it's now 15!)." That much-maligned malaise speech about the need to address environmental challenges isn't looking so silly now, is it? A couple of other notable points from his report, with my comments:

The leaders of Google, Monsanto, DuPont, Aspen, CDC, Alliance of Automobile manufacturers, eBay, German CEOs of huge wind-power companies, NGOs, etc. reported on current plans and progress.

(That must have been interesting. Obviously a cruise like this would be no place to launch a fierce debate or even to ask harsh questions, but it certainly seems as though the organizations represented have one or two differences of opinion and practice when it comes to sustainability.)

Biggest international interest now is how to extract more from Arctic region (fishing, minerals, transport, military) and not how minimize global damage. U.S. has refused to ratify the Law of the Sea treaty while Russia and other Arctic nations are making claims and taking action.

(Am I crazy or does this sound like a very big problem that is not getting anything like the attention it deserves from the mainstream media?)

Overall, the U.S. (and therefore the world) can act only if the next president can inspire the public and work harmoniously with a bi-partisan Congress, business, labor, science, environmentalists, educators, news media, etc.

(While undoubtedly true, this strikes me as a fairly depressing statement, since it will take a lot more than "inspiration" to get this motley group of self-interested players to work together harmoniously.)

All in all, I'm afraid the environmental crises we are facing are going to have to get worse before we have much chance of making them better.

Labels: Arctic, Climate and Carbon, Jimmy Carter, Monsanto, Role of Government

As the 2008 presidential campaign heats up, perhaps the only point of agreement between Barack Obama and John McCain is that our country needs dramatic change. Both candidates are campaigning as change agents: Obama's slogan is "Change you can trust," while McCain campaigns on "Reform, Prosperity and Peace," which, if you stop to think about where America is today, is just another way of saying "change."

Neither candidate has been specific about what change is needed nor about how he plans to make the change, and I doubt that either one has a detailed plan for change that goes much beyond the hope to change his own address to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

Perhaps you're wondering what this has to do with the theme of sustainable business. Actually, the connection is simple. In the world of sustainability, corporate executives are trying to change their organizations in all sorts of ways, from culture and systems to the way they recruit and compensate their people to how they measure and report their performance. What can this year's presidential candidates learn from business leaders about creating change?

I've written before about how Mike Morris, one of my favorite CEOs (and clients, although I had very little to do with what follows) has created culture change at the electric companies he has been invited to lead, from Consumers Energy to Northeast Utilities (NU) and now American Electric Power.

At NU, Morris worked with his deputy Dennis Welch, the VP of Environment, Health and Safety, to turn New England's largest power company from a cantankerous, arrogant, regulatory scofflaw into a model of environmental compliance.

On arrival, he announced that he would not tolerate obstructionism or hardball tactics when it came to dealing with regulators. Within days, he set an example by going to see the Connecticut Attorney General and legislative leaders, and traveling to meet with employees at the plants for face-to-face discussions on critical compliance issues. At the same time, he appointed Welch to create a company-wide environmental management system. Plant managers and employees would now be evaluated on their ability to make their programs compliant and keep them that way.

As a result, NU drastically reduced its legal problems and was ultimately able to sell its "troubled" (i.e. historically non-compliant) nuclear power plant (aptly named Millstone), for hundreds of millions of dollars more than its predicted sale price.

Now Morris and Welch are making change again at AEP, one of the nation's largest electric companies, which also happens to be the single largest consumer of coal on the planet. For over a century, AEP has been an innovator in the electric business, with hundreds of patents to its credit. But the company's ability to create solutions, along with its gigantic size and financial success, led to a sense of hubris and an our-way-or-the-highway approach to doing business.

When Morris arrived, deregulation and climate change were already rocking AEP's world. Reliance on coal, our dirtiest source of energy, was increasingly under attack He realized that the company's culture needed to change, and change quickly.

Morris sent a strong message, first to his leadership team and then through the ranks: "In today’s interdependent world, our ability to succeed as a business will be based on our willingness and ability to work collaboratively with all of our stakeholders, not just tell them what we plan to do." He then modeled this behavior, not only by demonstrating direct, solid and useful relations with political and industry leaders, and with AEP unions and employees, but also by showing candor and honesty in discussing the company's strengths and weaknesses.

For example, Morris wrote in the company’s first sustainability report that, despite many accomplishments, "2006 cannot be counted as a good year for us. One of our employees died on the job doing what should have been a routine task, and a contract worker died in a fire at a construction site . . . [T]his is completely unacceptable to me, to our company and to our employees." The report also detailed the company’s positive and negative environmental, health, and safety impacts--unlike many sustainability reports, which are filled with pure "happy talk."

Once again, Welsh began to create programs to back up Morris' words. He buttressed the company's health and safety programs with clear accountability standards. He launched a stakeholder engagement process with Ceres and national environmental organizations, and held periodic environmental calls with them like those the company held with investors and financial analysts. This year, the company has expanded the process to include stakeholder engagement at the regional, state, and local levels.

Will this new approach provide AEP with the breathing room it needs to develop the new clean-coal and other technologies it needs to succeed for another hundred years? The jury is still out. But it's fair to say that Morris and AEP have been a breath of fresh air in the debate over how to address climate change.

Which brings me back to our presidential candidates. If they're serious about change, Morris and other corporate sustainability leaders like Chad Holiday at DuPont and Katsuaki Watanabe at Toyota, who are transforming their companies for leadership in the 21st century, have a lot to teach them--about sending clear, unambiguous messages concerning the need for cultural change, and then matching their own actions to their words; about altering processes and incentives within an organization (or an administration) so as to reward new modes of behavior; about establishing lines of communication and accountability with outside stakeholders of every kind, including those usually considered adversaries; and, above all, about practicing genuine transparency--which, of course, is possible only when you really have nothing to hide.

If the next president practices policies like these, he'll go a long way to restoring the faith in government that millions of Americans have lost in the last decade.

Labels: American Electric Power, Barack Obama, C-Suite, John McCain, Management and Organization, Mike Morris, Role of Government

Here's a quite interesting report from The Economist about how business executives are incorporating environmental factors into their decision-making. The highlighted list of findings from the survey of 320 international execs includes:

(1) Environmental risk management is frequently managed in an ad hoc fashion.

(2) There is no clear consensus about who should be responsible for environmental risk.

(3) Many companies conduct strategic activities without a formal assessment of environmental risk. . .

That third item is perhaps the most interesting. To spell it out in more detail, consider these specific data:

Less than half [of the companies surveyed] conduct an environmental assessment when developing new products and services, falling to 32 percent when selecting suppliers or partners, 26 percent when planning geographical expansion and 19 percent when planning mergers and acquisitions.

These findings certainly call into question the general assumption that most corporations today are doing a reasonably good job of considering environmental factors when making major decisions. In fact, they suggest just the opposite--that most companies are facing environmental risks not pro-actively but reactively, scrambling to figure out what to do with environmental problems after they jump up and bite them rather than anticipating and avoiding or minimizing them.

The survey leads me to conclude that we're mostly past the point of having to convince CEOs and their stratospheric colleagues of the relevance and importance of environmental issues. Now the challenge is getting these issues built into the decision-making systems of corporations, alongside financial, regulatory, legal, and other issues that routinely get examined and addressed before any big decision is made.

Labels: C-Suite, environmental issues, risk management, strategic planning, The Economist

I recently visited St. Paul, Minnesota, with my seven-year-old daughter to attend the wedding of a friend. At the suggestion of the bride, we stayed at the Radisson Hotel Bloomington, near the airport. "It’s connected to the Mall of America Water Park. Your daughter will be in heaven."

Now, I like Minnesota a lot, especially the Twin Cities: fabulous public universities, the highest literacy rate in the nation, and millions of my kind of people—progressive Democrats, and nice folks too. But this trip threw me for a loop, literally and figuratively.

We checked in and went straight to the water park. "America’s Biggest Indoor Water Park" does not nearly begin to describe the incredible size, variety, and complexity of its many features, which involve pumping millions of gallons of water up and down three-story water slides, surfing safaris, lazy rivers, family rafting excursions, gigantic buckets that fill until they tip over and douse you, artificial beaches with three-foot waves, and much more.

If you’re among those who are concerned about the wastefulness of shipping bottled water around the world, we are talking about waste of another order of magnitude here. Picture—as just one example—thousands of jets of water being pumped up a 30-degree incline so hard and fast that a 200-pound man can actually "surf" along it without ever slipping towards the bottom. And this thing runs from nine a.m. until ten p.m. every day, whether someone is riding the wave or not.

It's well known that Americans, who make up just five percent of the world's population, consume twenty-five percent of its energy resources. Who knew how much of it went to hanging ten in Bloomington?

Don’t get me wrong, my daughter and I had the time of our lives—screaming hilarity, endless giggling, and serious father-daughter bonding as we spent about the monthly income of the average Kenyan to cavort indoors while outside was one of the most beautiful early summer days imaginable.

I thought this was a guilty pleasure until we dried, changed, and crossed the street to experience the Mall of America (MOA).

Of course, it's the largest mall in America--which must mean the world, right? Wrong: A little research reveals that the Mall of America is actually seventeenth on the list of the world's largest malls. As measured by Gross Leasable Area (GLA), it's less than half the size of the South China Mall in Dongguan, China--yet another category in which the United States is being left in the dust by countries many of us still think of as second-rate competition.

Nonetheless, Mall of America boasts a startling list of superlatives. It has an amusement park at its center five times the size of the water park. We rode several different roller-coasters, including Pepsi's Orange Streak (see how I worked in the name of my client there?), but decided to skip the nausea-inducing Splat-O-Sphere after watching it haul 75 people up sixty feet, then drop them fifty-nine feet back down.

Of course, shopping is the main attraction. The mall directory lists over 520 retail stores and restaurants on three gigantic floors. The first-time shopper orients herself by locating the four humongous anchor tenants—Macy’s, Nordstrom, Bloomingdale's, and Sears—each of which occupies all three stories and is located at one corner of the mall.

I have written about over-consumption, but we need a new word to describe what happens at MOA. The term mega-consumption comes to mind. You can shop at 17 jewelers, get footwear at 24 shoe stores, and dine at any and all of 74 eateries. Looking for a souvenir to bring home? MOA houses 37 gift shops, from the ubiquitous Yankee Candle and Disney store to regional establishments like Love From Minnesota and the Minnesota Wild Hockey Lodge.

We were in Minnesota for exactly 41 hours (25 of them awake), enough for three trips to the mall. We found great clothing bargains for my fashion-conscious daughter as well as a lifetime supply of SpongeBob SquarePants memorabilia.

I'm still trying to recover from the trip. Not the expense, but the alternating sense of terror and glee that the mall and the water park inspired in me.

I wonder what people will see and think when they visit the same site two hundred years from now. My guess is that the water park will be long gone, a victim of rising energy prices and water shortages. But the mall may still be there, unless virtual shopping has replaced the real deal—or society as we know it has collapsed under its own weight due to causes it will take some future Jared Diamond to analyze and chronicle. In which case MOA will be an abandoned hulk, overgrown by the returning north woods and perhaps used for shelter by animals and the occasional homeless human.

The few witnesses who wander past will probably think, "In their time, they lived like gods." Then again, they may wonder, "What the hell were they thinking?" Maybe both.

This is the first in a new series of columns we're writing for Ethical Corporation magazine.

Labels: Mall of America, Minnesota, Personal Musings

Check out this nice little piece from the Columbia Journalism Review online about how and why environmental reporting goes wrong, often generating more buzz and controversy than information (let alone wisdom).

Some of the problems highlighted by author David Downs are pretty much unavoidable. For example, there's the need to constantly define and explain environmental terms and scientific principles, which eats up precious column space and frustrates journalists who want to write brief, snappy, alluring stories. Other problems are products of today's culture of journalism, such as the pressure to build stories around great quotes (whether or not those quotes are truly enlightening) and the urge to treat every factoid or scientific study as important (whether those details represent outliers or genuinely meaningful symptoms of real change).

In any case, it's clear that journalists and editors who read Downs's article and make a conscientious effort to avoid the mistakes he lists will do a better job of informing readers about environments issues. Come to think of it, there are reporters covering lots of other fields, especially politics, who could benefit from a similar analysis.

Labels: David Downs, journalism, Personal Musings

Fairbanks, Alaska, is one of the most isolated cities in the United States--so much so that, until recently, it had no affordable way of recycling paper, plastic, aluminum, and other waste materials. Unlike governments in more southerly Alaskan cities, the Fairbanks municipality can't afford to ship its recyclables to a plant in Washington state for reuse.

Now a big private-sector player has stepped in to offer a solution to the problem. It turns out that the local Wal-Mart is already regularly sending trucks back to Washington--mostly empty, after goods for sale in Fairbanks are unloaded. So now Wal-Mart has started its own recycling program, shipping its waste products to Washington for reuse, and it has offered to include refuse from local people at no cost to the community. A few details:

The store's decision to accept recyclables--in reasonable quantities, as it will fall to the store’s paid employees to handle them--is sure to be a hit with its regular shoppers, who live in a community that lacks a conventional recycling program. It's also likely to create an interesting decision for Wal-Mart critics in Fairbanks who either avoid super-retailers in protest of their significant, indirect impact on locally owned businesses and the labor pool or those who believe Wal-Mart is simply hoping recyclers will be inclined to buy more merchandise from a friendlier company.

Suzy Fenner, a community recycling advocate, said Fairbanks residents are currently left with imperfect options--such as burning gasoline to haul paper and plastic to a willing business, which then burns more energy to ship the products out of state. Fenner applauded Wal-Mart's initiative and suggested it will help nudge public awareness of recycling options closer toward the point of a public program or more private-sector involvement. . . .

Store officials made it clear: They’re not turning into a recycling center. But they also said they can accept some common, everyday recyclables, such as loose paper or old newspapers, empty plastic soda bottles or milk jugs, and empty aluminum cans--during business hours. Managers said anything larger than a heavy armful should be bundled or bagged to help associates manage. Recyclers should also phone ahead with bigger loads and use the company’s back loading dock. They should also separate plastics--Nos. 1 and 2--by type, which is identifiable by the number imprinted on the bottom of products.

Wal-Mart, naturally, is proudly trumpeting this news of its latest "good neighbor" policy. But as is usually the case when private/public lines get blurred, the most appropriate feelings seem to be mixed ones. When cash-strapped governments are unable to provide basic services to their citizens, it's nice that big private companies are willing to fill the gap. (We all remember the spate of stories about Wal-Mart and other firms providing disaster relief after Katrina on a more timely basis than FEMA.)

But let's face it, having private enterprise offer public benefits on a charitable basis is not a sustainable long-term program. What happens when Wal-Mart's trucks get filled with their own recyclables, crowding out public materials? What if the demand for recycling services becomes so great it takes up too much costly time on the part of Wal-Mart employees? At a fundamental level, why should a necessary public good like recycling be provided purely as a "favor" by a self-interested business, rather than as a right funded by taxpayers for the benefit of taxpayers?

After all, unlike rights, favors can always be taken away.

So two cheers to Wal-Mart in this case--but here's hoping the people of Fairbanks won't be willing to settle for this as a long-term answer to their recycling dilemma. It's not one.

Labels: Fairbanks, recycling, Wal-Mart, Waste

Shortly after we wrote this post commending Wal-Mart for moving to all-compact detergents in its stores, our friend Dennis Salazar alerted us to a story he'd recently written about the same phenomenon. After shopping for detergent and buying the new compact bottle, Dennis's take on the change wasn't quite so positive:

The [old] 200-ounce bottle, which sells for $9.99, promised it was good for 64 loads. The new 100-ounce bottle, the one that was double strength so only half the usual amount was now needed, also sells for $9.99--but promised only 52 loads.

The bottom line for my sustainable purchase? A load of laundry which used to cost my family 13.2 cents in detergent now, thanks to the new sustainable design, will cost 15.6 cents per load. That, my co-consumer friends, amounts to a price increase of 18.2 percent--a splendid windfall for the manufacturer by any standard.

Of course, these calculations do not even take into account that we are all creatures of habit. No doubt, the manufacturer realized and even projected that most of their customers would use more than the recommended "half" of their more expensive product, despite the new concentrated formulation and labeling. Hmmm . . . sell the consumer more product at a substantially higher profit margin? You've got to love this sustainability. And incidentally, the big-box store where I shop, the one that took credit publicly for driving the package design change, isn't complaining about the windfall, probably because they are participating in it.

We asked Dennis whether this apparent windfall applied to just one one detergent brand or had affected many brands. He told us that, without doing an exhaustive survey, he noticed that several detergents seemed to exhibit the same kind of unannounced price increase (most smaller than the one he wrote about).

Dennis also told us he'd written his article with two lessons in mind:

1. For the businessman--to help dispel the misconception that green always costs more. The fact is that going green usually reduces costs and re-sizing is a marvelous opportunity to re-price your product.

2. For the consumer--Don't take everything at face value. Do the homework it takes to determine the best value.

Both are good lessons, of course. But the first lesson makes us a little nervous. If clever business people start regularly using green initiatives as an opportunity to reap windfall profits through "re-pricing," the already significant cynicism many people feel about green propaganda will surely get a lot worse.

One more point. Wal-Mart's own original blog post about the switch to compact detergents drew a number of comments, some of which raised the issue of price. The most substantive of these, by "Sunny," read as follows:

There are two reasons why the cost [of detergent] isn't going to go down, and neither of them really have much to do with the cost of oil.

First, believe it or not, smaller containers are quite a lot more expensive to product than the bigger ones, because the ratio of empty space per unit of plastic is much lower in a smaller bottle. In other words, it doesn't take four times as much plastic to make a one-gallon bottle as it does to make a one-quart bottle. The cost difference isn't as drastic with cardboard cartons, but it exists--and small boxes aren't cheaper per bottle inside than big boxes.

Second, the only thing being taken out of the formulation is water--for which the manufacturers' cost is negligible. It's the surfactants and cleaners and other things that make up the cost--so eliminating the water doesn't change the price enough to be able to mark it down.

So . . . it will take less packaging (but not as a direct ratio to the smaller package size)--and less cardboard--less space on the shelf--less effort to stock the shelves (and carry it home!)--and will allow the manufacturers to load more in a single truck--and the empties will be easier to recycle or will take less space in a landfill.

So--the tangible benefits are many, but the cost savings directly to the consumer really won't change that much.

Realistically, we all know that prices tend to rise, and it's no great shock when the unit cost of an item creeps upward at the same time that a new package, new product formula, or other change is introduced.

But we hope manufacturers and retailers who are trying to earn "green cred" will be very careful about how they handle those increases. The last thing they want to do is besmirch the concept of sustainability and inspire a consumer backlash against it.

Labels: compact detergents, Dennis Salazar, Packaging, Wal-Mart

Since the average business person doesn't regularly read The American Prospect--a liberal magazine focused mainly on politics--we want to call your attention to this special report on water. It includes no fewer than thirteen well-researched and well-written stories on one of tomorrow's hottest environmental, social, political, and economic issues--supplying water to the world.

Topics covered in the report include issues around water supply privatization, the backlash against bottled water, how new water technologies can help alleviate long-term shortages, and close looks at exemplary water struggles in places like Cambodia, the Phillippines, and the Middle East. Well worth a look, especially since water issues will soon be affecting every business in the world.

Labels: The American Prospect, Water