ASLU 101: Reducing Waste In Your Creative Business

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This episode is brought to you by Fine Lime Designs Illustrations

More and more of us small business owners are taking a critical look at the sustainability and carbon footprints of our businesses - especially as the effects of climate change are becoming a very tangible reality.

Can we reduce physical waste? What about the amount of power and fuel we use? How far do our raw materials have to travel? What can we reuse and repurpose? Are we wasting time? What about human resources? There’s a lot to think about!

In this episode Melissa, Heather Travis and Puneeta Chhitwal-Varma discuss why reducing waste and increasing sustainability in their creative businesses is so important to them and what they're doing about it. They share some of the things they've learned as well as practical tips sent in from the And She Looked Up audience!

This Episode Is For…

This is a great episode for anyone who:

  • is concerned about the environment

  • wants to increase sustainability and reduce the carbon footprint of their art or maker business

  • wants to be more profitable by wasting less resources

  • wants to make steps towards a greener business but doesn't know where or how to start

If you just want the links to the resources mentioned in this episode, scroll down to the bottom.

Listen To the Episode

Here’s a link to this week’s episode. You can also listen via the player below or on your favourite podcast app (Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Amazon Music, Stitcher, and more). Just search for And She Looked Up!

there is power in your passion

in this episode we discuss:

  • why reducing waste in our businesses is so important to each of us

  • how eco is the prefix of “economy”

  • different types of waste to consider: physical, energy, water, time and human resources

  • packaging and “unboxing” experiences

  • reevaluating our tools and raw materials: what they’re made of and how we dispose of them

  • the guilt around using something that’s not ideal

  • re-evaluating what we produce in our businesses based on its environmental impact and what happens to our products when people tire of them

  • changing our physical way of working in order to be more sustainable

  • evaluating how our raw materials get to us

  • buying our supplies and materials in bulk where possible for fewer trips (and cheaper prices!)

  • reducing food and packaging waste in our studio spaces

  • not thinking of disposable as an option

  • event swag if you host classes or workshops - what are you giving out and what is the purpose of it?

  • the freebies you put in your orders when you package them

  • organizing your scrap materials so you can reuse them or what to do with your old product

  • constant awareness of what we use and how we use it

  • where will this item be in 10 years?

  • encouraging your customers to purposefully and creative reuse or recycle your product when they’re done with it

  • recognize the power we have in initiating changes. We have power through our passion.

Mentioned In This Episode:

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Podcast EpisodeMelissa HartfielS3, creative enterpreneurshp, sustainability, profitability, waste reductionComment