He had seen the light.
He had gotten religion.
He was going to save the world.
The company has made some good first steps. They tell truck drivers that they can not idle your engine in their docks or parking lots. They recycle all their shrink wrap. Good. Installed energy efficient lights in most if not all their buildings. Another good. They asked all their employees to fill out a personal sheet in what they were going to do to save the world. Good idea. Very poorly done. They now have containers in their break room for plastics, paper and regular garbage. Another very good idea but again very poorly exacted.
My guess is that nearly every "green" project has had a positive addition to the bottom line. If you take into account the free press they have received then they have made mega dollars on every project. Sometimes doing good requires you to make a sacrifice and and not just ask others to make them for you.
A couple of other things they could do. Re-cycle the waste heat for their refrigeration unites in each store.
Paint the roofs white in all their stores.
Quite watering their plants and shrubs in the middle of the day. (do it aster dark)
Invest in training the management staff of all their units in how important this is to the company as well so the world.
Install "curtains" on all the open refrigeration units so they can be closed off at night. Then demand that they be used. Presently they had tops for their "spot" freezers which are never used.
The most important tool they have is the power of their morning meetings. Meetings to motivate everyone to work harder and make more money for the company. A meeting to help the workers work safer and help the bottom line.
Maybe the need to think of a new bottom line. Not one that will just line their pockets with some extra cash but a bottom line that 20 years from now their children will have a sane and safe world so that they can shop at WALMART.
The problem with this thought is that the company would have to hire manager or train managers to have to be concerned with things other than the bottom line as their only reason for existence. This needs to come from the top down. So every day when the Vice Presidents are calling and talking about payroll they need to call and talk about carbon.
A general manager will care nothing about saving energy or even saving money if the money saved is not saved in an area that the Market Manager cares about that day or week.
But just think what could happen if just 10 or 20 percent of the workers took the message to heart and went home and practiced them. They each may get one or two more people to join the band. And as Woody would have said pretty soon you have a movement.
I just do not think that this company has the courage to be the leader of such a movement.
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