(Aside: the cowards who ran the factory let him come in anyway. They should have said, “No mask? Then no tour.” Perhaps they were afraid of being ridiculed in a nasty tweet. Or of losing a federal contract. The former, which was quite likely, would put them in a prestigious club of people and organizations important enough to be publicly scorned by the country’s most incompetent president. The latter would have been a juicy lawsuit, and meanwhile, New England’s governors would have been falling all over themselves to grab those suddenly available supplies.)
The man who also refused to take the necessary actions months ago that would have contained the virus impact, as countries from Vietnam to New Zealand did, along with countries more comparable to the US, like Germany and South Korea.
If it were either Juneteenth or Tulsa, it could conceivably have been a coincidence. But to have the kick-off event for the revived in-person re-election campaign held on that day, in that city, could not be a coincidence. It’s a dog-whistle to the racists, no doubt schemed up by one of DT’s senior advisors (I don’t think the man himself is educated enough to know about Tulsa, and it wouldn’t shock me if he hadn’t known what Juneteenth is.)
A marketer friend in Connecticut sent out a wonderful tribute to his 95-year-old mom and used her to illustrate several points about customer-centric marketing and customer service. In the course of this article, he waxed rhapsodic about Amazon. I see Amazon (and some other companies) as not always so wonderful–and the public having blinders on about its predatory practices. This is what I wrote back to my friend. The third link is actually a very complete summary of the issues:
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Great piece! I love the way you take your mom’s everyday activities and spin them into marketing do and don’ts.
While you certainly shouldn’t change it for Mom, you might want to rethink Amazon. It is very much a two-edged sword. It’s great that it has made the Long Tail [the ability to find obscure products that don’t support a large retail base and wouldn’t be stocked in physical stores] a thing and that any author has access to international markets. But…
They are a serious threat to the vibrancy of our downtowns. Can you imagine Stamford with only a few struggling chain stores? Goodbye to that nice falafel shop and Asian restaurant across the street from (Amazon-owned) Whole Foods (I’ve often eaten at one or the other on my way to NYC). Book stores, hardware stores, appliance stores–and all the traffic into town those stores bring–are increasingly shaky in an Amazon-dominated world. And when that foot traffic goes away (assuming it comes back after we’re finally out of quarantine), so do the restaurants, night spots, etc.
Their labor record is very poor. Their treatment of independent publishers is not only very poor but IMHO a violation of monopoly rules. Did you know that Amazon, a retailer, takes the 55% industry-standard wholesaler discount instead of the 40% retailer level for its smaller publishers selling them physical books? (They do have much better deals for publishers on the books their subsidiary KDP prints on demand.) This is one of the two reasons they’re killing the independent bookstores (the other is that they’ve successfully trained the public to think of them first). Also, they present used and new versions of the same title on the same results page, which is a complete stab in the back to publishers–sort of like offering counterfeit designer watches and purses. I have no objection to selling used books (and keeping them out of landfills)–but not in direct competition with the same book, new.
For a long time, Amazon didn’t charge sales tax, which was an especially cruel anticompetitive practice in that it not only hurt businesses who have to collect those taxes, but also reduced the availability of government services by reducing government revenues.
Amazon has actively and repeatedly suppressed competitors. This includes using its enormous data on customer behavior and buying patterns to manufacture its own products, sold through its own channels. And students of the company’s behavior see evidence that once competitors are eliminated or demand spikes (as on household cleaning products during the pandemic), Amazon’s prices rise, sharply.
For these reasons, I buy from my local independent food markets, booksellers, appliance, and hardware stores (on their websites, currently) and shortly after Amazon bought it, I stopped going to Whole Foods even though it’s actually my closest supermarket.
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That was the end of my letter. I love the convenience of online ordering too, but I’m happy to do it at the websites of independent businesses, especially if they’re local to me. What are your thoughts?
We still have a long way to go on eco-friendly packaging. I just finished a box of crackers. I washed out the plastic tray and will add it to the plastics recycling bag when it dries, put the box in the paper recycling bin, and threw away the shrink-wrap around the tray in the actual trash.
Excess packaging: cracker box, tray, and inner shrink-wrap. Photo by Shel Horowitz
Most people won’t bother to do all this. Designers: this is a profit opportunity for you: create packaging that people only have to put in one place when it’s over, and that can be repurposed later–and remember that today’s compostable “solution” is only an alternative if people have access to an industrial compost facility. Most people don’t.
And businesses: as you adopt truly eco-friendly packaging, you’ve got a branding and marketing opportunity.
50 years ago today, Earth Day was launched as a one-time event. Who would know it would not only become annual but turn into a massive worldwide movement that has changed our world for the better in so many ways?
Photo by Stephanie Hofschlaeger
The Environmental Movement is Now Mainstream
Since that first Earth Day, we’ve made a lot of progress. A few examples:
Public awareness of climate issues–and of the lifestyle changes we can make to improve things–is at an all-time high
Millions of people have taken to the streets to demand action on climate
Science has made huge strides in areas ranging from green energy to biomimicry; amazing new green technologies are constantly becoming more efficient, less expensive, and more deployable
Many countries have shifted away from fossil and nuclear toward clean technoogies such as solar, wind, and hydro–and these technologies are much more efficient than they were 50 years ago
Veganism and vegetarianism (two of the easiest ways to reduce our personal climate footprint) are far more accepted, even in places like Germany that used to be quite hostile)
From bringing our own reusable bags (pre-COVID) to discovering foods like tofu, the way we shop and eat has drastically shifted, even for those still eating meat
Nearly every country in the world agreed to the Paris Climate Accord (which doesn’t go nearly far enough, and which the current US administration has pledged to leave–but it’s a start)
A 16-year-old Swedish climate activist addressed the UN, arriving in the US aboard a green-energy boat (yes, I’m talking about Greta Thunberg)
Almost every major company has at least a sustainability coordinator, if not a whole department–and these folks have drastically reduced the negative impact of business on the environment
Here in the US, the well-thought-out Green New Deal is getting serious attention
We’re beginning to recognize climate justice: looking at the environment from a lens that includes economic and social justice issues, such as why so many polluting plants are in poor communities and why so many of those communities are “food deserts” with little or no access to healthy foods
My Environmental Journey Started That Day
I was 13, and I was one of the people “captured” by that first Earth Day. Ever since then, I’ve given a lot of thought to, and taken a lot of action on, ways I can live more lightly–and how I can help others, both individuals and institutions, make that shift.
This has taken many forms, from street activism to lobbying to addressing business audiences with messages on how to make green social entrepreneurship sexy and profitable to writing books that show how this can be done.
I’ve also made many lifestyle shifts, from biking 5 miles to high school at age 15 and becoming vegetarian at 16 to converting my house to a heat and hot water system using cow poop and food waste from our farmer neighbors at age 61 and carting unbagged groceries out to the reusable bags I keep in the car at 63 (since we can’t bring them into the stores anymore).
In my activist life, I’ve been lucky to participate in three major environmental victories:
In 1977, I was one of about 2,000 people and 1414 who got arrested at the construction site of the Seabrook nuclear power plant in New Hampshire. We had no way of knowing that our action would birth a national safe energy movement. On the 40th anniversary, I wrote about why this action was so important. (The link is to Part 1 of my 5-part series. There’s a link to the next installment at the bottom of each earlier one.)
In 1984, I worked with my city counselor to get the first nonsmokers’ rights regulations in Northampton, Massachusetts. Very few communities had any protection for non-smokers at that time. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that within a few years, most restaurants in town were non-smoking and that the number of restaurants in town increased significantly.
And in 1999, I founded and became the public face of the movement that saved a mountain right near my house.
It was the success of Save the Mountain that led me into the work of educating the business community on how to be profitable while saving the world.
This is not new. Social impact companies have been around at least since the mid-19th century, but it’s been on the fringe. Believe it or not, UK chocolate giant Cadbury was founded as a social impact company. But I think now we have the chance to change the entire business culture, so profitable business social and environmental responsibility becomes mainstream.
But There’s Still Lots to Be Done!
For all its positive presence, business is still a long way from solving problems it largely created. Pollution, resource depletion, and labor issues are just a few of many issues that need to be addressed, especially as world population grows faster than at any time in history. And governments are not always our allies. The present Brazilian and US federal governments, for instance, are actively sabotaging the eco-agenda. Each of us needs to make the difference we can make–and each of us CAN find a way to make that difference (contact me if you want help figuring out what the most impactful way for you and your business).
No Cost Resources and MY Gift to Help You Celebrate Earth Day THIS Year
Let’s start this Earth Day party off with something that will help you save energy, water, and money–my ebook, Painless Green: 111 Tips to Help the Environment, Lower Your Carbon Footprint, Cut Your Budget, and Improve Your Quality of Life—With No Negative Impact on Your Lifestyle. I normally sell this for $9.95, but as my Earth Day gift to you, you can get it at no cost. Just visit PainlessGreenBook.com and enter “earthdayblog” in the code box. This will also sign you up to my informative Clean and Green Club monthly newsletter.
Our national museum, the Smithsonian Institution, has organized an online Earth Optimism Summit with a fantastic lineup including Denis Hayes, who organized that 1970 Earth Day…Christiana Figueres, top negotiator of the Paris Accords…NASA’s former Chief Scientist and current director of the National Air And Space Museum Ellen Stofan…Bill McKibben, founder of 350.org (among many others)
Another national virtual summit, Earthday Live 2020, offers three days of programming and a strong social justice focus.
A group based near me in Western Massachusetts, Climate Action Now, offers several Earth Day events starting this evening with a 6:30 ET panel of legislators and activists. This may be especially interest if you live in Massachusetts, but it’s virtual and open to all.
There’s plenty in those three articles that absolutely makes sense in today’s world–but there’s also quite a bit that’s at least temporarily obsolete.
With tips about how to bring reusable containers into the stores and organizing used clothing sharing events, it made me nostalgic for that very recent time before everything changed. And with a strong focus on combining climate, waste, and social justice, it was a refreshing reminder at how much more aware even we green folks are than most of us were 20 or 30 years ago.
True, it’s a bit more challenging to maintain a green lifestyle these days. But for the planet, it’s been a chance to recharge. The enormous reduction in motor vehicles on the road, planes in the sky, and factories running at full capacity allows our air and water to clean and regenerate themselves. And not to be Malthusian (and certainly not that I think this is a good thing), but the massive wave of deaths does reduce strain on the earth’s resources.
These positive changes have been somewhat offset by a dramatic uptick of certain other resources. Medical equipment, sanitation products, and even toilet paper are in short supply–and even more concerning, so are the medical personnel and hospital beds. And I’m guessing that as a world population, we’re generating a lot more waste and reusing a lot less.
In our own two-person, one-cat house, we’ve shifted some things as well. Our new routines might provide useful examples of how to be protected while staying as green as practical, so I’ll share a few of the details.
Water Use
What with not only washing our hands constantly for a full 20 seconds but taking a new glass or spoon every time and throwing our clothes in the washing machine every time we go to the store, our water use is probably triple what it was. We used to run the dishwasher about two, maybe three times in a typical week; now it’s more like five or six.
But even when we’re washing our hands so many times per day, we don’t turn the water on full force, and we turn it off when we’re not actually rubbing our hands under the faucet. We use just enough water to do a good job.
Fortunately, our heat and hot water are both on a green system powered by residual heat from cow poop and food waste running through our farmer neighbors’ methane digesters, and we live in an area where water is not scarce.
Cleaning Supplies
We’re also using somewhat more disposable paper products–but not all that much. For years, we’ve tended to use rags rather than paper towels to clean surfaces or mop up spills. But we are using paper towels or wipes to do things like keep our hands from touching door handles going into or out of a public place, wiping down shopping carts, etc. And of course, disinfecting the packaging we buy is something we never did before, and that uses a few paper towels.
My wife made us each a reusable mask. Since we’re usually shopping no more than once a week, it’s easy to wash them between uses.
We are not stockpiling, and we think the idea is silly. We’ve always bought toilet paper in 12-roll packs, and when we’re about half through, we get another 12-pack. When our bottle of dish soap gets down to half, we buy one more bottle. These patterns have not changed.
We are using more laundry detergent. Normally, we use a reusable laundry ball in the washing machine. We still do for regular wash, but for those post-shopping loads, we use hot or warm water, which the laundry ball isn’t designed for. We are almost through the box of earth-friendly detergent we bought about four years ago, but when that’s done, we inherited a huge tub of Arm & Hammer natural laundry powder when my stepfather died in 2018. I expect that it will last us the rest of our lives, considering we mostly use the laundry ball.
Packaging
As green consumers, we don’t bring a huge amount of packaged food into the house to begin with, and we save reusable glass and plastic containers when we do. We actually choose our brands of yogurt and hummus in part by whether we can put the containers and lids through the dishwasher and reuse them–and we use them until they break, usually at least 20 times. (We also factor in taste, quality, and price, of course.) Since forever, we use those jars to store bulk beans and grains, spices, and flours. Now, if we buy boxed cereal, for example, we wipe down the box and then either take the inner liner out and put it in a box we just finished, or put the cereal in jars.
When we buy bread or loose produce, we remove it from the plastic bag it came from and put it in one we’ve had pre-crisis; we have an entire hamper full of them. Cans get washed down with disinfectant, but other than cat food (which we buy in cases so the cans are protected), a small amount of canned beans, and coconut milk, we used almost no canned products anyway.
Since we’re not driving much, we have the luxury of leaving non-perishables in the car for a few days to decontaminate on their own–and while we still disinfect when we bring them in, we’re not quite as hyper-vigilant
Most of our produce is harvested at or near our home by the CSA farm we belong to, farmers at the local farmers markets and farm stands, or in our own garden. We’re washing everything more carefully. We’re washing citrus with soap. We’re peeling items like salad carrots instead of just grating the peels in with the rest of the carrot–but leaving peels on for cooked foods when appropriate, since heat kills the virus.
For years, we’ve kept reusable totebags in the car and brought them with us into stores. Now, we leave them in the car, load everything back into the shopping cart, unbagged, after it’s scanned, and then load them into our own bags at the car. So we’re still not getting bags, for the most part. This does mean we avoid shopping on bad-weather days.
Transportation and Shopping Choices
We live out in the country, seven miles from town. We’ve always ganged our errands into as few trips as practical, but now we’ve become almost religious about it. Going through the decontamination process every time we go shopping is annoying enough that we’re trying to shop no more than weekly, and preferably every two weeks. When we go, we think about everything we might need for 14 days, where we can get it with the fewest stops (rather than the lowest prices), and what route minimizes the miles to visit those stores.
One of the greenest things to do at this time is to actively support local independent businesses. We’ve shifted a much bigger percentage of our shopping dollars to the businesses we want to make sure survive, the ones that make our community a desirable place to live. We’re also ordering more online from these local businesses, and either picking up curbside or getting things shipped.
And sadly, we can’t car pool anymore. When we meet our friend who lives a mile from us to hike together (10 feet apart), she and we arrive in separate cars.
I haven’t needed any clothing except a package of socks I ordered online and picked up curbside. I would probably not go to a used clothing store right now, because it could be a germ factory. But I did arrange no-contact pickups for some books someone was giving away on our local Buy Nothing community, and for some items I had to offer. I let the books sit in the car and I will wipe them down before I shelve them.
Nostalgiawashing: pretending that you represent the “good old days” of small-town, small-business artisanship while actually running a large, highly mechanized operation.
Although I just invented the term (zero relevant hits on Google), nostalgiawashing’s been a thing for decades. Think about Jack Daniels or Pepperidge Farm. Or nostalgia-driven experience-based companies like Cracker Barrell and even Disney. (Disney is a bit schizophrenic on this, because it markets both nostalgia (for example, Main Street, USA) and its opposite, which I’ll call “tomorrowism” (for example, Epcot). All these companies try to bring us back to a simpler era, when nearly all the figures of authority were straight, white, middle-aged, able-bodied Christian men, and when the upper class could mostly avoid contact with the “masses yearning to breathe free”: immigrants and locally-born alike in the lower classes. Of course, that era never actually existed!
I’m not going on the warpath to eliminate nostalgia-based marketing, even when I think it’s deceptive enough to be called nostalgiawashing. But at least don”t insult our intelligence with it!
This is inspired by a mailing that did insult my intelligence. It was a card that offered “warm winter wishes” on the outside and then offered me a discount on replacement windows and “one of my favorite holiday recipes” (included on a separate index card). I have been a customer, getting replacement patio doors from them a few years ago, so I’ll give them credit for at least keeping in contact. Here’s why it didn’t work:
The envelope used a very nice handwriting font, but a return address sticker without a name, just an address…a first-class presort stamp and a sprayed-on barcode. It wasn’t difficult to figure out that this was bulk mail, though I thought it was from a charity.
The card is in a different handwriting font, even though it purports to be from the same person who addressed it. And they even positioned the text so it slants up the page–but uniformly on every line??? Come on, people, do you really think you’re fooling anyone?
I understand why the recipe card, on what pretends to be an old-fashioned index card, uses yet a third handwriting font–because, of course, the manager’s “Aunt Amy” wrote it. But at the end of the second side (not shown), it has a copyright notice in the name of the company. And the recipe itself is something I personally found disgusting. I can’t imagine wanting to make a dessert out of a whole sleeve of saltines, and Heath bar bits.
Of course, I don’t happen to be in the market for new windows anyway. Even if the mailer had been brilliant, I don’t need what they’re selling. But if they were a client of mine, I would have not only used a completely different approach, but recognized that not a lot of previous customers necessarily need four more windows right now and provided incentives for referrals.
Remember some of those unflattering names for TV in the 1960s and 70s? “Boob tube.” Idiot box.” I think these names are rooted in the neurological changes TV works on our brains, combined with the inherently passive nature of watching–AND with the low content quality that too often marks this powerful and addictive medium.
TV too often incites violence and racism. And I don’t choose to play in that sandbox. For every Mr. Rogers or Sesame Street inculcating positive values, for every National Geographic or Discovery Channel special that broadens our sense of what is possible, there are dozens of shoot-em-up adventure shows and newscasts to focus our attention on the worst parts of our society. And it’s all tied together with ads designed to make us feel inadequate because we don’t buy certain brands. As Mick Jagger sang, “He can’t be a man ’cause he doesn’t smoke/the same cigarettes as me.“
The original promise of cable TV was no ads in return for the monthly payment (1970s). But that original promise didn’t last very long! I grew up in NYC, which had seven stations on the VHF band, plus what must have been another 20 on UHF for those who had sets that could pull them in. Moving to places that had only two or three channels on the broadcast spectrum, I could see the appeal, at least for those who love TV.
TV is not an active part of my life.
We moved when I was 10 and left the big clunky ancient black-and-white TV behind. We didn’t get another one for two years–just in time to watch All In The Family. That was pretty much the only show I watched through high school. Through much of my early adult life, we didn’t even own a TV.
And when we got one, it was mostly as a video monitor, with some PBS kid shows on the side. We thought it was healthier to let our kids watch up to an hour a day of content-supervised TV than to ban it altogether and have it become alluring forbidden fruit.
A few years ago, when regular old broadcast TV was discontinued, our cable company gave us a converter box free for the first two years. We never even got it to work properly, and when the two years were up, we returned the box and eventually convinced them that we shouldn’t be paying the $10 month for a service we weren’t using. They acted deeply shocked but eventually lowered our bill. They supply both our landline phone and our broadband Internet.
A few times a year, we go to a friend’s house or a public place to watch a presidential debate, World Series game, or other special broadcast. I think TV news is the worst kind of mind pollution and get my news from other sources–that’s been true for decades, even when I had a working set. I still read my local daily newspaper, which has great coverage of my own region and at least some coverage of the wider world. I read a ton of e-newsletters that keep me informed within my various niches, and click to interesting links on social media (which has its own positives and negatives)–yes, including some TV clips. I’ll listen to radio news and public affairs programs such as All Things Considered (NPR) and Democracy Now (Pacifica). And yes, I spend some time daily on social media.
In fact, I deeply resent being forced to watch TV news with all its shallowness and violence when I ride elevators, wait for planes or buses or trains, or use a hotel fitness room. If there’s a great skit on Saturday Night Live or a new Randy Rainbow parody, or shocking testimony implicating high government officials, I will hear about it on Facebook and watch online. I worry about the people who spend so much time watching violence disguised as news, especially if they do it right before bed, leaving the whole night for the subconscious to absorb the message that this is normal.
While I don’t duck from the unpleasant things happening, I don’t steep myself in them. I surround myself with enough positive news (through those and many other channels) to insulate me from the bad effects of soaking in negativtiy. I recommend doing that as much as possible.
What strategies do YOU use to stay focused on the change you can make rather than letting the problems paralyze you? I’d love to see your comments, below.
Lately, my inbox is full of courses to market via Facebook Messenger.
I actually hit reply to one that began, “What if you could use FB Messenger to make up to $2,500 a week… in your spare time?”:
What if we could have ONE communication channel that doesn’t get polluted by marketers trying to hijack it? There is no refuge anymore! I remember when the only things in my inbox were things I wanted. I remember when I didn’t get blasted with texts from companies that don’t even know me. I am a marketer, and I understand the need to reach out. But damn it, we need some spaces where we’re not getting marketed to.
I do get it. Every time someone invents a great new communication tool, someone else invents a way to sneak marketing messages past the gatekeeper. And then someone else invents some protection. And usually, someone else invents a way to overcome that block.
Postal mail begat bulk mail, which begat opening mail over the recycle bin, which begat postcards and envelope teasers. Telephones begat outbound call centers, which begat caller ID, which begat robocalls with spoofed IDs. Email begat spam, which begat spam filters, which begat messages crafted to go around them, which begat Google’s Promotions and Social folders (which severely impacted legitimate newsletter publishers and didn’t seem to hurt the spammers much).
It’s an arms race. The Cold War in all your inboxes. Ads in toilet stalls. Digital ads on billboards changing every few seconds. Ads on the frame around the taxi rates placard on the divider between the front and back seats in a cab.
But here’s the thing: all of these intrusive methods are dinosaur-marketing. Seth Godin told us 20 years ago about permission marketing.
Seth Godin. Photo by Jill Greenberg. Courtesy of Seth Godin.
Seth has permission to be in MY mailbox. His daily blog shows up every day. I actually open and read every column for his useful information and fresh perspectives. Often, he offers a program or product—but it’s in context .
Seth walks his talk. And I buy from him occasionally. (I also sometimes share or email him comments. That, plus writing a great book, got him to endorse my 10th book, Guerrilla Marketing to Heal the World.)
You don’t win customers by shouting louder; you win them by being relevant and helpful, and using the technology intelligently:
Instead of random texting, text your own customers who’ve given you their mobile numbers as they show up within a mile of you, with friendly, helpful information about today’s cool event (yes, geotexting exists)
Instead of using robocalls to make deceptive offers, use them to notify your customer base of important news, like a weather-related school closing or a construction delay on a major artery
If your Facebook page uses the automated FB Messenger feature, send links to your FAQ and three most popular or useful pages on your own website—but also make sure you have a human being reading the inbound messages and responding quickly. And figure out a way to only send that autoresponder the first time you get a PM from any specific person.
So here’s MY soft-sell pitch at the end of this useful (I hope) content: if you need help developing non-intrusive, welcomed marketing, drop me a line or give me a call. Especially if your business or product/service/idea contributes to environmental and social good.
We always hear from conservatives that they don’t see how we can possibly afford universal health care, let alone the Green New Deal. Thus, as a public service, I’m listing five ways (among dozens if not hundreds) we can locate the funds. This is not even pretending to be comprehensive (or in any sort of order), and I’d love you to add your favorite in the comments.
Eliminate the private for-profit insurance system, which jacks up the price. According to The New Republic (2015), this is costing us between $375 billion and $471 billion per year. The savings in getting rid of the middlemen would more than cover the increase in taxes.
Cap doctors’ salaries at something reasonable and generous. I’ll pull a figure out of the air: 200K per year for generalists, 300K for specialists—but it could be higher or lower.
Eliminate the crazy subsidies and price protections in so many industries, and particularly fossil and nuclear fuel, Big Pharma, highways and bridges to nowhere, and chemiculture-based Big Ag. We are subsidizing all sorts of things that should not be subsidized! Our policies should support the changes we want society to make (but right now, our policies interfere with those changes.
Cut the military budget down to the expenditure of China (the country second on the list). Right now, the US is spending an obscene $649 billion per year (2016) to “defend” 329,345,285 people (more than the next seven countries combined). Yet China manages to protect 1,420,615,635 people, more than 4.3 times the US figure, with military spending of just $146 billion (2016), or less than a quarter overall, less than a sixteenth per capita. So if the US slashed military spending by 75 percent to match China’s, it would still be spending more than four times per person than China does. Surely that would be enough to protect ourselves!
So next time you meet someone who wonders how to pay for the world we want, this article gives part of the recipe. Readers, please add your own favorite ways to find the money for these improvements, and please include a source for your data.
Have you thought about investing in solar energy? Perhaps you want to consider solar but just haven’t had the time to sort out your options. Or perhaps you began looking into solar only to face confusing choices and unanswered questions.
You are not alone. Some homes are perfectly suited for solar energy and yet the homeowner hasn’t yet made the switch. Up until now, homeowners felt okay waiting… for “better technology” or “lower prices”, or simply avoided thinking about it at all. But now, with solar panels appearing on one neighbor’s home after another, with neighbors bragging about saving energy and money, and with rumors about the phasing out of tax credits and incentives, they (and you) might wonder: is it too late?
You can stop worrying today… it is not too late to go solar and it is easier than you might think. In this book, award-winning renewable energy expert Denise Rushing shows you how to say goodbye to ever-increasing utility power costs… and go solar with confidence!
This book is a good fit for you if… • You wonder if you should make the switch to solar energy; • You definitely don’t want to create complexity, headaches or hassle for you or your family; • You worry that solar incentives are gone, that the advantageous utility solar rates are in the past and wonder if solar is still worth it economically; • You want to save money on your electricity bill and add thousands of dollars in value to your home and wonder if solar can help you do that; • You want to do what is right for the environment, but worry about making the wrong choice; • You wonder if solar energy is right for your situation; • You want to know how to go solar with ease and confidence. Today, switching from expensive, dirty, utility power to clean, renewable, solar energy is easier and more economical than ever before. Go Solar With Confidence takes you step-by-step through the process and shows you how to say goodbye to ever-increasing utility power costs and buy a solar energy system that is right for you.
Go Solar With Confidence is a clear and practical guide to: •Learn how you can save money on your electricity bill and add thousands of dollars in value to your home; •Determine if your home qualifies for solar; •Discover the most important things you need to know about solar systems before you buy so that you can go in with the best knowledge possible; •Understand what you need to expertly interview any prospective solar provider. •Empower you to take the first step towards going solar so that you won’t have to worry about electric bills going up ever again!
Imagine running your home, and maybe even your automobile, on clean, renewable electricity generated from sunshine. You can gain the confidence and information you need to take the first (and the next) step toward solar energy for your home. Visit: https://www.energyqueen.net to learn more.
A solar building at the Earthship Community, outside Taos, New Mexico. Photo by Shel Horowitz
