Ideas for what to put in a Green Box?

Question

My Girl Scout troop is thinking of ways to go green and we thought of selling Green Packages filled with green stuff, like organic and recycled products, any ideas to help us?

Answer 1

Change the name; Green Box means composting.

Make it a Green Bag for shopping; design your own.

How about a re-usable lunch bag kit, no waste.

Get brochures from municipality on re-cycling, composting.

Include 'green' products: natural soap, cleaners, garden, etc.

Search the web for environmental products;-} get samples.

Answer 2

green bags.

Answer 3

Great idea!

I'd definitely include a few household items, such as a CFL bulb and a power strip. (Include a card with the benefits of CFL bulbs, and explain that electronics left plugged in while turned off suck energy, so the power strip lets people stop the energy use at the touch of a button.) You could also contact a good eco-friendly cleaning product company (like Seventh Generation (www.seventhgeneration.com) to see if they would be willing to ship some samples to include in the box. They'd like the business, so they may have samples you could have at a discount rate.

Consider some bath or body products as well. Again, I'd include information on why these are beneficial. A lemon eucalyptus-based mosquito repellent (DEET-free, and backed by the CDC and FDA) would be a good choice; there are commercial brands of this available at Target and other stores. Also, perhaps a small container of a household soap such as Dr. Bronner's (www.drbronner.com) with a card explaining why biodegradable soaps are better for the user and the environment.

I'd also call some local businesses that have green products or options. They may actual underwrite part of the boxes' costs to include a card or flier. Since it will introduce your customers to other green services, it helps everyone.

Find out if you have any local farmers, CSAs or organic producers who might be able to give you some fresh items (possibly with information in the box), so you could tell buyers, "This is organic and was grown locally, to cut carbon emissions from shipping it across the country." (Fresh items would only work if you had set delivery dates or planned to sell a bunch at a one-day event.)

Answer 4

Let us start by not calling it a green box. The Green Box system is a system for recycling food waste back to make compost.

We need to decide who is going to get the package you put together. It might include some cleaning rags to replace paper towel usage. It might include a small sheaf of note paper... paper that has been printed on one side, with the other side still usable before it has to go to recycling.

It might include recycled water. Oh, UGH. But no, all the water we ever use is recycled water. That is, water that has been contaminated, evaporated, and then came back to us as rain.

Symbolically then we might want water that we have not yet contaminated, water we have not stored in estrogenic plastic for instance. We want to avoid estrogenic plastics why?

(Oh yes, those nice clear bottled water containers are mostly estrogenic plastic. When subjected to higher temperatures of sunlight, they give off estrogen or estrogen like substances that bring on gender changes early, speed up the growth of cancers.) What will we carry about in place of those estrogenic plastic bottles?

Using 100% recycled toilet paper is a green move.

Now how would you symbolize the single most important change that has to happen, and what is it?

Answer 5

A cloth bag for shopping would be a good way to make some money.

I don't know if you can think of enough stuff to put in one box. You might want to sell separate products.

Answer 6

Yes, a name change is in order to avoid confusion.  How about calling it a Green Bag, as one person suggested, and filling it with environmentaly friendly Spring Cleaning items?  White vinegar, Fels Naphta soap makes a good spot remover for laundry, Borax is great for scrubbing, it even removes soap scum with a little elbow grease, and white vinegar cuts grease for cleaning.  All of these release far fewer chemicals than most of the heavy duty cleaners on the market.  Clean rags to scrub with are more eco friendly than using paper towels for major cleaning.

I loved the idea of recycled toilet paper but where can you find it?  Recycled paper towels and napkins might also be good if you can find them.  

Good luck on your idea.