Mean and Green: April Fool's, Courtesy of Grist

Grist's April Fool's Day issue just landed in my in-box, offering a faux news item:

Sale Ends Today!
Wal-Mart pulls the plug on green initiatives
Wal-Mart CEO Lee Scott, who announced a high-profile series of green corporate initiatives last year, has now ... taken them back. Citing high costs, Scott yesterday announced that Wal-Mart is canceling most of its sustainability programs, shifting its truck fleet back to diesel (from biofuels), shuttering its experimental hyper-efficient stores, and pulling organic products from its shelves. The only remaining evidence of Wal-Mart's much-ballyhooed green makeover will be -- you guessed it -- light bulbs. "We're keeping the compact fluorescents. Those are pretty cheap," said Scott. "The rest of the stuff we tried was too expensive. In the end, our customers value low prices more than sustainability, and at Wal-Mart, we listen to our customers."

Only the Grinch could have been greener and meaner!

I'm no big supporter of Wal-Mart, and have the intuitive (but not data driven) impression that they have done great damage to the rural business ecosystem.

That said, the reinvention of the self, recasting of image, is woven deep into the fabric the American dream-myth.

Grist's joke strikes me as being non-supportive of an alcoholic who is striving to achieve one year of sobriety...

Can't we all try to get along?

San Francisco Plastic Bag Ban

Given my obsession, I mean mission, this year with decreasing plastic bag usage, I can't completely fail to comment on this widely covered story (although I've tried to resist).

One point I've found interesting from the San Fransisco dialogue. That banning plastic bags will raise costs for small businesses, or consumers, to ban plastic bags. (I can't find the story, it must have been on NPR, where a San Francisco politician held forth on costs for small business.)

Um, who do you think is paying for the plastic bags now?

The cost of the bags is impounded into each of our purchases. (And not just that the bags cost X cents each. Someone has to order them, stock them, carry them out of the loading dock when they arrive at the store...)Our tax dollars cover the cost of disposal.

We are paying for plastic bags every day, in real dollars.

I've been thanked by more than one small business owner when I say "I don't need a bag." Profit margins in the grocery industry are paper thin...I think something like 5%. Whole Foods gives me a ten cent refund when I bring my own bag. Ikea charges consumers five cents.

So when I buy small item at the "Korean" deli on my block -- say a newspaper -- and they "give" me a plastic bag, which arguably costs them five or ten cents...well, you do the math on their profit margin. No wonder they thank me.

In the meantime, I'm happy that we're thinking about banning plastic bags in NYC, too!

I hope that this is good for businesses like Lisa Foster's 1 Bag at A Time. I received my shipment of bags from her, and have been giving them to friends.