It’s Blog Action Day! Today, I’ll be joined by thousands of other bloggers in a cool project. We’re all blogging about one thing today – the environment. So here’s my contribution.

We marketers always love win-win-win situations so that’s going to be the theme of my suggestions. How your business can be green, save you some money and do good all at the same time.

First up, recycle your ink and toner cartridges. Many of us know that you can drop these cartridges off at the local office supply store. Some printer companies even make it super convenient. I have an OKI color laser printer and each cartridge I buy, there is a bag and UPS shipping label all paid for. All I do is slip the used cartridges back, slap on the label and drop it off.

But let’s take this further. Be good to your community. Cash strapped schools may be involved in recycling programs. They’ll get much needed money for every cartridge they collect. So, send your ink and toner cartridges to school! If you don’t have school aged children, call the schools or go online. Plenty of places will take them if you’re willing to send them in. Funding Factory is one example. They even let you set up an account to track how much
you’ve given.

Send your cell phones to school too. Cell phones change faster than fashion these days. But what do you do with the old ones? Again, check with schools. Help them get some much needed cash for our children’s education by sending in your phones for recycling.

Another good place to send your cell phones to is Call To Protect, a program by the Wireless Foundation. They collect wireless phones and provide them to domestic violence survivors.

Re-use paper. When I worked for Canon (office automation), our office had a big bin next to the copier machine on every floor. It’s not a trash bin, but a paper recycling bin. When you make copies and it didn’t come out as planned or maybe you made too many copies, you drop the extra/botched jobs in the bin.

Whenever anyone needed scratch paper, something to draft letters, take down notes, messages etc, you head straight for the recycle bin and grab some paper. You’re not allowed to use fresh paper unless the recycle bin was out.

I was only 19 when I joined their marketing team and thought – how cheap! But now I know the wisdom in it. Waste not, want not, save the trees and the company bottom line too. It’s so ingrained in me that I do the same thing in my home office. Every botched print out or copy goes into the recycle bin and I let my kids draw on them. Sure, they complain that the paper is not pristine and has other things on the other side of it. But, this is also a good time to educate them about recycling and saving money. Killed
three birds with one stone again.

Donate your thumb drives. Do you have old thumb drives (USB memory stick) you don’t use anymore? Donate them to businesses, aid workers and students in developing countries who cannot afford but need them. Send them in to Inveneo and they’ll get them out there for
you.

Donate your old computers. There are many organizations who’ll take old computers and send them to schools, economically disadvantaged people, people with disabilities, use them for job training or send them to those who have been affected by disasters. One such organization is The National Cristina Foundation.

Big reminder. If you’re donating any computers, cell phones, drives, or just anything that used to store data, make sure you reset and erase everything before sending it anywhere.