How Green Are Your Metrics? - Your Carbon Footprint

• List the raw materials involved in creating your marketing materials (paper and ink for printing, outdoor, magazines, plastic, etc.).
• Calculate the percentage of each raw material that comes from recycled, renewable, or sustainable sources.
• Set improvement goals for increasing those percentages.

• Measure the route and distance of every vehicle involved, and how much fuel they use to get from point to point.
• Can more fuel efficient vehicles be used?
• Can a more efficient route be found?
• Can alternative fuel be used?
• Can you lighten the load to enable less fuel used?
• Can some materials be drop-shipped directly from or to suppliers, cutting out a middle delivery step?
• Are you using the most effective medium for reaching your customer? Would a different medium be more efficient and effective?

• Measure the amount of energy output and the type of energy used in every step of your marketing process.
• Can less energy be used to achieve the same result?
• Can alternative energy be used?

• How many data centers are required to host the Web page?
• How many megawatts of power are required to maintain that data and pump it through the system to get it to the consumer?
• Can the data center be made more efficient and less energy intensive?

• Measure every form and amount of waste output.
• Can waste material be sold to make something else?
• Can it be recycled?
• Are you currently recovering the product from the consumer after its useful life has ended? If so, to what degree? If not, establish KPIs for this. (Example: Dell offers free recycling of customers’ old computers.)

• Measure and reduce energy output used to run the business (for each location).
• Measure and reduce fuel used in day-to-day business (for each location), including:
  • the starting and stopping destinations of the trucks and how far they traveled;
  • their filled weight;
  • how much material each truck carries;
  • how much fuel it burns in transit;
  • whether that fuel is regular or diesel; and
  • how much carbon dioxide each gallon of gas emits when burned.
• Estimate the value of the business interruption risk that could be caused by a lack of energy/fuel availability or interruption as a result of a terrorist attack or some other reason.
• Estimate the value of the business interruption risk that could result from a significant spike in petroleum prices.
• Map out alternative fuel sources available today and tomorrow (wind, solar, ethanol, rain water recovery); determine the benefits (both profit-making and risk-averting) of incorporating each one (separately and collectively) into your business; determine a timeframe and a plan for moving forward; and measure your success.

• Reduce product size and weight.
• Reduce the amount of virgin material used in product manufacturing and replacement with recycled material.
• Reduce the overall number of raw materials or the volume of each raw material.
• Increase the number of products that can fit on a flat (skid).
• Increase the number of flats that can fit on a truck.
• Reduce the number of trucks needed and/or weight of each truck.

• Measure before/after brand perception.
• Measure before/after effect on sales, shareholder value, etc.

• total direct and indirect greenhouse gas emissions by weight;
• initiatives to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and reductions achieved;
• initiatives to reuse or recycle waste;
• total water discharge by quality and destination;
• total weight of waste; and
• weight of transported, imported, exported, or treated hazardous waste.