Eco-Friendly Products Catch On

By Susan Q. Stranahan, AARP Bulletin Today

July 29, 2009

Penny Johnston’s Maine Float-Rope Co. produces colorful doormats from the lines cast aside by lobstermen. Photo courtesy Maine Float-Rope Co. 

“Green” ventures prove viable for creative entrepreneurs. 

As millions of feet of old polypropylene rope filled wharves and warehouses along the Maine coast, Penny Johnston saw a chance to clean up. So was born the Maine Float-Rope Co., which today produces colorful doormats from the indestructible discards of local lobstermen.

When 168,000 pounds of line ended up on a pier in Rockland earlier this year, Johnston quickly did the math: 30,000 doormats. More line will become available this summer as lobstermen continue to cast aside the buoyant rope that they can no longer use. New federal rules now require using rope that sinks to the sea floor, which poses no threat of entangling endangered whales. “We’ll never run out” of raw materials, the 69-year-old Johnston says with a laugh.

Johnston moved to Maine from Connecticut 5 1/2 years ago and since then has started several eco-businesses. She’s recycled and sold barn boards and timbers, which are used to make furniture and building materials, as well as granite foundations and fieldstone walls, used for home construction and landscaping. Now, it’s lobster lines into doormats.

Growing demand for green products

Earlier this year, Johnston’s doormats were named Best New Product at the annual New England Products Trade Show, and she’s been busy filling orders ever since. “I have a hard time sitting still,” she says, while walking around the grounds of her sprawling home. She had it built out of old barn boards and granite on a scenic neck of land in coastal Waldoboro.

Johnston is one of a number of small entrepreneurs who are cashing in on the growing demand for green products. That demand represents “one of the most significant shifts in consumer attitudes in this country’s history,” according to the National Retail Federation.

Although interest in environmentally friendly products has been steadily increasing over the years, in 2007 “the green bandwagon arrived,” says Willard Ander, a marketing executive in Chicago and coauthor of Greentailing and Other Revolutions in Retail. 

And that bandwagon extends beyond small businesses to a green industry. The Pew Charitable Trusts in June reported that between 1998 and 2007, clean-energy jobs—both white- and blue-collar positions—grew by 9.1 percent, compared with total job growth of only 3.7 percent.

Ander adds that the support for green products and practices appears to be recession-proof: “The current economy has not slowed it down.”

So far, most of the green start-ups are small, boutique enterprises. But if consumer demand for eco-friendly products is a measure of sustainable growth, then the industry’s future looks good. In a recent survey for the National Retail Federation, 85 percent of consumers said that the importance of environmentally friendly stores and products is the same or greater even in a weak economy.

Taking the leap

Two years ago, Deborah de Moulpied had an idea for a new type of recycling container and was combing the Internet to see if anybody was making something similar. As she poked around, she discovered a number of stores in the West selling green home goods. “I had never heard of these kinds of stores,” says de Moulpied, 54, of Concord, N.H. “I asked myself, Why don’t we have some here?” So in July 2007, she opened Real Green Goods, which she describes as “an earth-friendly department store.”

It was a big leap. “I had never been in business before. I was starting out with a fresh idea at age 50-plus—really scary, big-time scary,” she says. But she believed in the concept. 

“I felt this was the future. That gave me a lot of confidence to proceed.”

De Moulpied’s timing was right. In the first year, her business grew by 55 percent. Her typical customer is “not the green guru” type, she says, but a mainstream customer looking for, say, high-efficiency light bulbs. De Moulpied offers educational programs and information about the products she sells. She also publishes a monthly newsletter and tries to buy locally made merchandise whenever possible. “There are lots of stories behind our products, and that makes them very endearing,” she says.

Here to stay

Green is not just a fad, says Jennifer Allen, acting director of Portland (Ore.) State University’s Center for Sustainable Processes and Practices, and businesses like de Moulpied’s and Johnston’s are generating a lot of excitement and opportunity.

Allen, who has studied business and the environment for two decades, believes the heightened interest in green businesses reflects “a long-term trajectory.” Consumers of all ages have begun to expect manufacturers and retailers to be environmentally responsible.

Allen has tracked a number of green start-up companies, launched by people who have retired or lost their jobs and want to begin a new venture, or by entrepreneurs who believe they can offer a unique product or service.

Case in point is Michael D. Perry, who saw his new business gain a foothold in the Pacific Northwest. Today, his seven-year-old Virginia Beach, Va.-based company, Building Logics, has gone national, and he has reported a 25 percent growth each year for the past three years.

Perry, 51, an engineer with an interest in architecture, builds green roofs, which sustain grass or gardens and conserve energy and water. He admits that “the whole idea is contrary to everything we’ve ever learned about roofs.”

“Roofing always has been totally opposite of environmental perspectives,” says Perry. “We used asbestos, which is good for what we do, but bad for every other reason. If anything ever grew on your roof, it would void your warranty. All roofs are designed to get rid of water as quickly as possible. But now, we’re planting and growing stuff on roofs intentionally.”

Winning the acceptance of builders and building owners initially was difficult. “It required a 180-degree turn in thinking,” Perry says. Although the recent slump in construction has hurt his bottom line, he is optimistic.

“In our industry today, this is probably the hottest technology available,” he says. “We’re excited about the future.”

So is Penny Johnston, who sold several Maine Float-Rope doormats when she introduced them at the New England Products Trade Show. In addition to finding a new use for the old rope—which otherwise would have been ground up and made into plastic pots, or dumped in a landfill—she donates a percentage of each sale to the Gulf of Maine Lobster Foundation. “I’m happy I’m doing something good,” she says.

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