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25 Oct 02 - junk mail; bags; business case studies; hangers; toxics; AOL ** WASTE PREVENTION FORUM ** -- A project of the National Waste Prevention Coalition -------- Forum archive: http://www.reuses.com/nwpcarchive -------------------- From Tom Watson, King County Solid Waste Division, Seattle, WA, and the National Waste Prevention Coalition: ADVO MAILING LIST REMOVAL FORM Advo - a major national direct mailer that sends out coupon packets and other advertising material under the name ShopWise, and other names - is now providing a form on its website that people can send in to be removed from Advo's mailing lists. (Thanks to Seattle resident Desiree Merulli for telling us about this!) The Advo list removal form (which also gives the address you need to send it to) is at: http://www.advo.com/html/contacts/removeform.pdf This Advo web page gives more information on Advo's list removal policies and process: http://www.advo.com/html/contacts/faq.pdf According to its website, Advo was established in 1929, and is the nation's largest full-service targeted direct mail marketing services company. Advo has annual revenues of more than $1 billion and ranks as the single largest private customer of the U. S. Postal Service. Advo maintains a proprietary mailing list of 126 million resident addresses. -------------------- The next two messages are in response to the recent postings about grocery bags (including a suggestion that the new National Waste Prevention Coalition project should be a campaign to promote reusable shopping bags, with some new twists). -------------------- From Sue Williams, Town & Country Markets, Bainbridge Island, WA: Regarding reused/reusable grocery bags: I work for six grocery stores in the Seattle area, and we sell cloth bags (at cost of $4.29) made from 100 percent PETE. Customers love them. In about a year and a half, we've sold over 5,000. When any bag is reused, the customer gets 5 cents credit. Unfortunately, for the one store that I have calculated the numbers, in a community where bag returns are likely higher than average, they account for only 3.6 percent of total bag usage (which is 28,000 per week). We hear all the time, "I have bags but I never remember to bring them in." I have tried to figure out how to remedy this, even passed out stickers that say "Grab Your Bags!" for customers to place by their door, on the steering wheel, etc. - but it didn't work. We at least may soon have a nearly guilt-free choice for those who cringe at having to answer to "paper or plastic" - bags that look, feel, and act like plastic but are made of 100 percent cornstarch, totally compostable. As for the worry that people won't want to take ABC's bag into XYZ's store, I've heard that before and don't really think it is a concern for many people. For those for whom it is, just turn the bag inside out! E-mail: osuzyanna ( A T ) hotmail ( D O T ) com -------------------- From Blair Pollock, Orange County Solid Waste Management Department, Chapel Hill, NC: Our local co-op, Weaver Street Market, with stores in Carrboro and Chapel Hill and annual sales over $10 million, has just dropped their five-cents-off-per-bag policy (the discount when customers brought their own bags). They said they were buying more paper and plastic bags than ever, not enough people brought their own bags, and it simply "wasn't worth it" (my words) to continue the discount. They instead provided a deep discount on their large cloth bag, offering it at cost ($3.99) instead of retail cost ($6.99). I felt this was an unfortunate choice and not in conformance with their ecological principles nor necessarily economical, for, as I understand it, the production price of a full-size paper grocery sack is about five cents (can others corroborate this number?). The national natural foods chain Whole Foods, which has a store here in Chapel Hill (they bought the other locally-owned store) continues to offer the five cents off for bringing your own grocery-sized bag. Is there some kind of economy of scale that dictates the feasibility of the five cents off per bag, or something else? E-mail: bpollock ( AT ) co ( DOT ) orange ( DOT ) nc ( DOT ) us -------------------- Links to business waste prevention case studies and "best practices" examples, on the website of the StopWa$te Partnership, a project of the Alameda County (CA) Waste Management Authority: - http://www.stopwaste.org/partnership/case.html - http://www.stopwaste.org/partnership/best.html -------------------- From Paul Dunn, City of Omaha Public Works Department, recycling program, Omaha, NE: This article in the Houston Business Journal about dry cleaning gives reference to hanger reuse (they call it recycling) about half way through. They also talk about alternative chemicals near the end. http://houston.bizjournals.com/houston/stories/2002/10/21/smallb1.html E-mail: pdunn (AT) ci (DOT) omaha (DOT) ne (DOT) us -------------------- Links to fact sheets from the Inform website, regarding toxics and alternatives that may be used by government agencies, schools, hospitals and other institutions: - Art Departments http://www.informinc.org/fsart.pdf - Building Construction and Maintenance Departments http://www.informinc.org/fsbldgs.pdf - Health Care Facilities http://www.informinc.org/fshealth.pdf - Public Works Depts. and Vehicle Maint. Facilities http://www.informinc.org/fspubworks.pdf - Schools, Colleges, and Universities http://www.informinc.org/fsschools.pdf - Mercury-Containing Products and Alternatives http://www.informinc.org/fsmercalts.pdf - Mercury in a Health Care Setting http://www.informinc.org/fsmerchealth.pdf These fact sheets may take awhile to load. Inform is a New York City-based non-profit environmental research and education organization. -------------------- Link to a 10/18/02 article by Rusty Dornin on the CNN website about the campaign to collect one million America Online (AOL) promotional CDs and send them back to AOL (this follows up on past postings about this campaign): http://www.cnn.com/2002/TECH/internet/10/17/aol.discs/index.html - end -