The Sustainable Revolution is here. Our economy demands it, our kids depend on it and as parents it is our honor-bound duty to come out, swords blazing, with ideas and actions to lead the charge toward a greener future.
Before we engage in well-intentioned marauding, let’s explore the map. The newness of our efforts, as a culture of activist parents, means we first need to agree on a few terms. Words like “organic” and “green” are rather carelessly thrown about by both companies and consumers – so let’s clear up any confusion.
Resources like Healthy Child Healthy World (www.healthychild.org) make it much easier for all of us to shop responsibly. Thanks to them, business owners like me, can provide you – the consumer – with more information and better product options, leaving you more time to spend with your kids because you spend less time worrying about their health, and the health of our planet.
Organic is an important component of sustainability. It mostly refers to raw materials that are grown, produced, and processed without the use of toxic chemicals like pesticides and artificial growth agents. We use organic ingredients for Epicuren Baby skin care products because they have more nutritional value with greater antioxidant capabilities than their non-organic counterparts. This is important: Because of the skin’s transdermal properties, many nutrients applied to the skin are absorbed into the bloodstream and distributed throughout the body. Unfortunately, the same is true for harmful chemicals that are remarkably prevalent in personal care products – even those marketed for children. So, as a consumer, you can make well-considered choices about personal grooming products for your children in order to help protect them and the planet from environmental pollution.
A “green” product refers to the production, packaging distribution and even consumption of a product and the carbon footprint that process leaves behind. Green products are often made with organic ingredients, but must also incorporate environmentally sensitive manufacturing and operational practices to be truly “sustainable”. A sustainable company considers all the logistics involved in producing a product and takes actions both large and small to reduce their carbon footprint. For example, I manufacture the Epicuren Baby products in a solar powered manufacturing plant and use only Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certified or recycled paper packaging. I also ensure that the various buildings and facilities in my business are within a 50-mile radius of each other. All of our invoicing and most of our marketing is paperless.
At home, you are on the front line of the Sustainable Revolution – driving us toward a new, Vivid Green Generation. A critical aspect of your participation is as a teacher and role model to your children. Through everyday activities and conversations; turning off water while they are soaping-up their hands and brushing their teeth, turning off the lights, and using chemical-free personal care products, you are ensuring a positive future of environmentalism. So involve your children in your efforts – both large (buying a hybrid, installing solar panels) and small (turning off the computer at night) to reduce your family’s carbon footprint, because every conversation you have with a curious child supports great health and a strong future.
