Grist points out an article in today’s Wall Street Journal on new companies that offer environmentally friendlier products for sale at fundraisers for schools and non-profit organizations.

As the article observes, selling products that are environmentally (or otherwise) harmful to raise funds for a good cause clearly sends a mixed message. This concern can be elevated in importance when it is children who are asked to sell products to raise funds for their school. Such concerns helped prompt the entrepreneurs cited in the article to find better alternatives to the standard fundraising offerings.

The Wall Street Journal article Businesses Emerge to Help School Fund-Raisers Go Green notes that changing attitudes about consumption, health, and the environment are altering parents’ choices about the products they would like to see offered in school fundraisers. Traditional choices such as candy and cookie dough are on their way out due to growing awareness of childhood obesity. Worries about lead or other hazardous substances in some types of imported products for children also sparked doubts about what school fundraisers were attempting to promote. (Whether such fundraisers are an appropriate means to fund an education system is another question, which is not examined by the article.) Outside of education, some nonprofits are likely wrestling with some similar questions.

Lisa Olson founded Greenraising in response to growing interest in environmentally responsible products as well as the apparent mismatch between typical fundraising products and the lessons that schools sought to impart about the environment and health. Her company says that it was started not only to help raise funds for schools, but also to “give children an opportunity to learn that their actions can change the world.”

Greenraising sells reusable lunch bags made from recycled materials by a women’s cooperative, reusable water bottles, environmentally friendly cleaning supplies, and fair trade tea and other products. It enables school or other non-profit groups to raise funds through its website or through catalog-based fundraiser drives.

Another company in this field is Green Students Fundraising, which is based in Toronto. This company got started in 2006 by offering compact fluorescent light bulbs for sale through school fundraisers and began to expand its offerings as the energy-efficient bulbs became more commonplace. Green Students Fundraising keeps track of the carbon dioxide emissions that its bulbs have displaced, which currently stands at 1,262,750 kilograms. It also makes use of Facebook in its marketing efforts.

You can see a Canadian television interview with Green Students Fundraising founder Corey Berman and its marketing manager, Michelle Boigon, below:

While one might question why we continue to rely upon fundraisers to provide a share of the resources for public education, it is encouraging to see some people who are making the best of the situation for students, parents, and the environment.

Evan

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