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Le Café Des Spores grows Oyster and Shittake mushrooms using recycled coffee grounds. The practice significantly reduces waste and provides mushrooms for local consumption, reducing the need to transport the product and therefore reducing energy costs.
I interviewed Rick, the Nutrition Smart Pembroke Pines store manager.
"Nutrition Smart is a health food store that provides natural organic foods and high-quality pure vitamins and supplements to our valued customers. We bring to market the newest and most advanced products promoting good health and nutrition. The board of directors, corporate officers, executive management, and staff of Nutrition Smart, in implementing the mission of the corporation, pledge to value their employees, customers, and the community."
Nutrition Smart is in alignment with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals:
American Paint Recyclers, a family run operation, took the innovative idea of recycling unwanted paint and built a profitable business that is beneficial to communities and the environment.
As part of the Borealis business objectives and value proposition, Borealis checks all necessary boxes to be considered “Innovation Eligible”. Borealis achieves multiple UN Sustainable Development Goals. It has generated a profit through socially responsible actions that are embedded as part of its normal operations. Finally, Borealis Grille & Bar has developed a business model based on sustainable goals and practices that are scalable into other markets.
Cosmic Bobbins is a fresh example of a local company on a mission for social goodness. The small boutique places a firm focus on up-cycling while developing and fostering local educational partnerships. Giving back to the community while limiting environmental impact is at their core.
Local + Lejos focused on empowering women by creating steady employment opportunities while helping them to build the sustainable skills they need to build a better life for their families and communities. The marketplace is trending toward more socially conscious brands. The company attains profits from the margins it holds on the products it sells to consumers. The company is continuing to reinvest its profits directly back into the company to grow the number of artisan partnerships as well as the product offerings. Local + Lejos not only helps these women set up their own bank accounts, but also offers training tools on how to build up their savings and make decisions that better their families.
Aspiration is an LA-based online financial services firm with a conscience. The firm is on a mission to democratize access to alternative and sustainable investment tools for the American middle class. By building trust through its transparent “Pay What Is Fair” model, Aspiration empowers customers to choose a management fee within their budget. Aspiration provides funds that include alternative investments, normally available to only the most wealthy, for only a $500 minimum investment. Other innovations include the Redwood Fund, a sustainable investment tool that supports companies with progressive environmental and social practices. Alexandra Horigan, who was interviewed for this story, is the Director of Compliance and Operations.
Large scale energy savings
Glass that can change tint reducing solar glare (smart glass)
Reduction in heating and cooling units
Manufacturing innovation
Massive long term energy savings
Flourishing employees and businesses
Integrity Taxes and Accounting, Inc., has been in business for more than a decade. Samantha Porter wanted to create a company that would maximize results and meet customers' needs. With so many people not having the opportunity to learn healthy financial habits, she knew the field of finance was the route to go. Integrity Taxes and Accounting has helped hundreds of customers with their tax return preparation and financial planning. The company started off with 20 clients; today they are up to 400 customers and counting.
Mrs. Porter's innovation has made a difference in so many people’s lives -- it's a small business doing big things in the community. She believes that you increase success when you create a “culture of giving.” So she decided to create a program that uses her knowledge and her company's resources to help youth learn financial literacy. She explains, “We realize no one is teaching our kids about youth financial literacy, how to cultivate their ideas, because so many of us have shunned them away with their business ideas.”
The mission has been set and the vision is clear. All Florida Paper is flexing its muscles, but not in typical ways for a distribution company. Establishing itself as a company that is more than just warehouses, trucks, and inventory, All Florida Paper has grown to fully accept the responsibility of changing its business approach in order to be the best distributor of paper and janitorial/sanitation products through its sustainability initiatives. It fully understands that sustainability is a way of doing business with an awareness of the company’s impact on society. Based out of Miami, FL, it has constantly pushed the envelope in its business innovations to make environmental sustainability one of the cornerstone pieces of how it conducts business better and smarter.
All Florida Paper’s sustainability initiatives include: bringing greener lighting to its 130,000 square foot warehouse, reducing its carbon footprint on the road, making recycling its buzz word, promoting eco friendly products that have low-maintenance energy requirements, as well as reducing its paper consumption by more than 60% throughout day-to-day operations. Founder and president Armando Caceres has lead the charge in the expansion of these initiatives through the belief of employee empowerment and encouragement.
“About 20 years ago, the company was founded by a married couple, Armando and Marisol Caceres. They started from the bottom. With a small initial investment and a truck, they started buying and distributing. Eventually they moved into this building almost 10 years ago. They are very responsible owners, who are involved in daily operations," said Macarena Acre, company controller. "Unlike absentee owners who just collect a check, they are always working. It's a very strong foundation here."
Dedication's Dance Academy is using their student's love of dance as a platform to educate them, their parents, and community residents and other locals on the importance of leading healthy and active lifestyles so they can help take a stand against childhood and adult obesity.
Ital construction is a small company focused on construction of major buildings in the urban areas of Miami Dade County. The company has a very small full time but dedicated staff -- the majority of staff employed on projects varies between projects. Overall, the staff forms a diverse and rich cultural background with the majority being local residents of surrounding communities. Stanley Sarmiento, project manager of Ital Construction, took the time to talk to us about some of the measures and innovations Ital Construction is implementing to work towards sustainability. Before getting into the measures that Ital Construction takes to be more environmentally and economically sound, it is important to mention that Stanley has a motivating, personal reason to pursue these sustainable practices.
Stanley grew up in Cartagena, Colombia in Latin America. While growing up there, Stanley explained to us, drinking water was hard to come by in this coastal city. Moreover, the infrastructure of the city contributed to the pollution of Cartagena, from poor water and sewer facilities, to storm water runoff contaminating rivers and streams. Stanley left Colombia when he was 8 years old and his family immigrated to the United States looking for a better future for their family.
Stanley graduated from Miami Sunset Senior High, and decided that he was going to get into the construction business. He got his general contractor (GC) license and soon after met Danilo Cacace, owner of Ital Construction. Danilo, originally from Italy, came from a poor family in Napoli; he immigrated to the United States with dreams of opening his own business. Stanley and Danilo met at an innovations convention held in Fort Lauderdale. Thereafter Stanley became his Project manager and sole confidante on business practices for the business.
The Sunshine Nut Company was founded in 2011 by a man with an amazing innovative vision, a unique business model, a commitment to humanity, and the business acumen to blend his aspirations with the calling of his faith. The evolution of the Sunshine Nut Company is nothing short of incredible.
Sunshine's purpose is to develop a profitable market for smallholder farmer communities "transforming the lives of the poor and orphaned in sub-Saharan Africa." The company's roasting factory employs young men and women who were abandoned or orphaned in their youth by years of violent civil war. Cashews are sourced from local farmers.
Don Larson, the company's founder, has developed a business model called the Sunshine Approach, which has a quadruple bottom line: financial, environmental, social, and transformational. Companies using the model develop world-class food products in sub-Saharan African countries benefiting the entire value chain. "90 percent of the company’s distributed profits will go to the poor and orphaned of the country, 30 percent to orphan care, 30 percent to transformative projects for farming communities, and 30 percent as a growth component to open up other food companies using this same philanthropic business model.” (Don Larson, 2016)
Why it’s a sustainable technology:
Because Green Sense Concrete is optimized for cost and performance, many tangible benefits can be realized by the entire construction team.
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Environmental Agencies/Community:
Dovetail Solar and Wind is a Cleveland, Ohio’s fast-growing and profitable designer and installer of green energy systems.
During the lifetime of its operations, Dovetail has installed large solar arrays, many of them on businesses and public buildings.
One of Dovetail's key achievements has been the design and installation of a 225 kilowatt solar photovoltaic (PV) array that at its time was the largest in an Ohio’s municipality; this PV system is located on a set of car canopies over the Athens Community Center parking lot, and provides more than 25% of the annual electricity for the large Athens Community Center.
Although PV systems are Dovetail’s largest source of revenue, this company has also pioneered the design and installation of wind turbine power systems as well as solar thermal heating.