Hi Umbra,
A friend and I were recently discussing a conundrum about purchasing products from companies that have physical retail outlets and online purchasing, like The Body Shop. Which is the most ecologically sound option? Local store: most likely drive there, the products had to be shipped there, your purchase probably generates a need to ship more products there ... but you are supporting a local business that pays taxes, etc. Buy online, maybe your items are coming from the same place that ships to stores, so you are essentially cutting out the middle person, but it does take resources to get the product to your house. See what I'm getting at? Any input would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!
Catherine
Pacific Grove, Calif.
Dearest Catherine,
Please endure my obligatory gentle reminders to reduce consumption of unnecessary objects and bundle your errands when you do drive. Choosing the better way to shop is not better than not shopping.
What's in your wallet?
Photo: iStockphoto
That said, the minds-that-be have not decided quite yet whether online shopping is better than in-person shopping. To the layperson, online seems to have a bit of an intuitive advantage -- but intuition means little, as we have learned via the related paper vs. plastic situation.
You would barely credit all the variables involved in this one. Online "stores" have a major advantage in their -- can one say -- ecology of scale. They have fewer built and conditioned spaces. The online Body Shop, to use your example, is (we imagine) one large warehouse, whereas the in-person shop is many small stores, each with its own heating, cooling, lighting, and decorative bric-a-brac. But "which is better" gets trickier once an online item is ordered. In-person stores have a little ecology of scale in packaging and shipping, as (we imagine) if you order one unguent online it comes in its own package, whereas at the store you buy an unguent that shared its shipping package with its clones. And the e-item is a big packaging hog, causing two and a half times the impact of in-person items.
That's the intuitive deal breaker, right? But wait: one of the groups that studied the issue found that a 40-mile car trip to buy something was worse, climate-wise, than shipping two five-pound packages by overnight mail.
I'm dizzy, dizzy with this pseudo-dilemma. So far we have underlined what we already kind of guessed: driving alone to a faraway place to buy very little is worse than having a few things shipped. My trips to the mall as a teen to buy a few cassettes (round trip: three hours) were worse than online shopping, and Netflix (reusable packaging!) is far better than my pater's 30-mile drive to the video store. But what if we go with friends, or don't drive so very far? How about if we take a bus? What about a few miles to buy a gift for someone else, which we then ship from the post office, versus online and par avion direct to the recipient? What if you turned off all your appliances and your heat and spent the day at the mall using their heat and toilets and sponge bathing in their sinks? Would that be better?
Even if local shopping isn't always the best ecological choice, it might benefit your own other priorities. Your Body Shop example gives us a bit of trouble, since it's a franchise. There is a local owner, and local employees, and local taxes, which all sounds good until we remember the same could be said of McDonald's. What we want in "local" will need to be defined a little more tightly, and perhaps differently for each of us. Amazon is a local company to me (since I live in Seattle), and so is Starbucks. My friends work in those places, but this does not trump my personal preference for individual, in-person, small businesses in the living landscape of my city.
Hence, in sum: the jury is out. Follow your common sense until the jury comes back in. Don't take long, single-occupancy, single-purpose car trips for lightweight consumer items. (I leave you an out for picking up a potter's wheel or an anvil.) Avoid shipping by air -- plan ahead and don't be impatient when online shopping. And bundle shopping, shipping, and driving with others when possible.
Peppermint scrubly,
Umbra
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Comments View as Flat
Bytesmiths Posted 4:00 am
07 May 2007
Bundling Rocks!
"... and bundle shopping, shipping, and driving with others when possible."
YAY, UMBRA! That should have gone right after "reduce" in the lead!
We defer and combine almost all of our in-person shopping.
I used to do that with on-line shopping, as well, but I no longer trust them to "do the right thing."
I maintained a list of books I wanted next to the computer. When it got up to an amount I was willing to spend at once, I placed an order with Amazon, basking in the glow of knowing all those books would make one unified trip through the system.
Imagine my horror and revulsion when each of the dozen books arrived as individual shipments! So now I still maintain such a list, but I wait until I have at least several other reasons to go to Portland, Oregon, and then I satisfy my "book jones" with a trip to the wonderful, local, brick-n-mortar Powel's Bookstore.
(BTW: Powell's is a big "drop shipper" for Amazon. So cut out the middleman when buying used or out-of-print books and go right to the Powell's website.)
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tboggia Posted 4:30 am
07 May 2007
Server rooms
Surprisingly enough, there is a pretty large cooling energy use attributed to on-line shipping, especially for large chains such as Amazon. There is an incredible amount of servers used to host all of the product info, and these servers have to be constantly cooled, 24/7. Even though you would not be going to an air conditioned mall, you would still be visiting an air conditioned web site.
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michweek Posted 5:30 am
07 May 2007
Two with one stone!
Well it's to seems far more efficient to me to keep the car parked and walk to the store. Carrying my own cloth bag, especially when in cities. It's a good time to take a stroll, relax, look at the world around you and help the environment! No worries about weather a car is more wasteful vs the packaging, eliminating both!
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michweek Posted 5:33 am
07 May 2007
Powells
I live in that wonderful town!
Powells and all the other local shops in our area are really fun and neat to shop at! How fun! I'm glad to find more powells lovers and my wonderful towns name! :D
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szaino Posted 6:36 am
07 May 2007
buying online
At least, if you do buy online, buy through one of the shopping websites which work with companies to get a percentage, even so small, to your favorite environmental charity.
Every little bit helps.
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beklina Posted 6:43 am
07 May 2007
online is great :)
Hi,
We ship in bags so they're really light, and used a lot of recycled packaging. Also we give to Carbonfree.org to offset the shipping.
I can't stand malls, but if you can stroll through a town or a nice city, nothing beats that.
Come for a visit. www.beklina.com -women's & children's eco fashion.
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eborelli Posted 6:49 am
07 May 2007
Online Shopping - Depends on the Store
Hello!
As an online eco-friendly retailer I'm super conscientious about packaging. I either reuse or buy recycled for all of my packaging and shipping needs. It's more costly for me to do it that way, but it's consistent with my green living philosophy. I know most members of Co-Op America, producer of the National Green Pages resource for all things green, do the same. If you shop with CoOp America members, you're supporting the green community and you can be pretty sure these retailers are following through with eco-conscientious practices on the back end as well.
Check out coopamerica.org for more info.
Best wishes,
Elizabeth Borelli
www.nubiusorganics.com
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EnviroGal Posted 6:53 am
07 May 2007
Online vs. In Person Shopping
One of the sites that make donations to environmental causes when you shop online is www.Care2.com You can order from Amazon.com - and a bunch of other companies - but if you access Amazon.com through Care2 rather than going directly there, you can make a difference .....
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karenc Posted 7:23 am
07 May 2007
sponge bathing in mall sinks!
I loved the idea! Turn off all your appliances, turn off your heat and air conditioning, and sponge bathe in mall sinks! Oh wait... I can't stand malls. I'll have to stay home with everything turned off or walk to my favorite shopping with my cloth bag- the thrift store. But I had a fun flashback to Madonna washing her hairy armpits in the sink, then drying them with the electric hand dryer (Desperately Seeking Susan). Thanks!
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Chris Schults Posted 10:08 am
07 May 2007
Support Grist
EnviroGal, in case you didn't know, when you click on a Powell's or Amazon link on Grist and then buy something, Grist receives a small commission. Also, if you're going to do some online shopping, check out the Grist store where we've rounded up some of the eco-friendly products available on Amazon.com
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Drison Posted 11:52 am
07 May 2007
Distribution centers
Another thing to keep in mind is the fact that when suppliers send bulk shipments to land based stores they go to a distribution center in most cases, where they are sorted and repaletized and shrink wrapped according to where its going. So there is added power/materials that negates the bulk shipping to land based stores. Most of these DC's run 24/7. Ive been to a walmart DC and while amazed at just how many environmental precautions are taken, 1.5 million square feet of machinery and packaging per dc is a pretty big footprint. Just a thought.
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bralessliving Posted 12:54 pm
07 May 2007
yes to whatever umbra said
Umbra is awesome, every time she could give a poseur answer she doesn't, right on Umbra...
So stop shopping before you kill us or buy from indy places. That Body Shop lady is completely loaded. I'm not anti being loaded I just think she should start giving some of it away now.
I need money. I get fired from jobs on a weekly basis and I'm freelance...lol...
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kristaheld Posted 2:23 pm
07 May 2007
Choose your eco-shopping impact online
Okay, I must admit that I have not actually purchased anything from the online store that I am about to tout, but www.alonovo.com is quite amazon-esque and allows a user to set a profile for thresholds of social and ecological responsibility for what a user purchases and from where. I still am not clear on how it all comes together, but I do know that it is a somewhat eco-friendly option when going e-shopping.
Krista
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Chris Schults Posted 2:22 am
08 May 2007
alonovo.com
Krista, actually, alonovo.com is powered by Amazon.com where I think Grist is one of the non-profit beneficiaries.
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kenrosso Posted 3:25 am
08 May 2007
economy of the living
"my personal preference for individual, in-person, small businesses in the living landscape of my city. "
Word. For me, the crucial factor will always be, "What consumption pattern supports the world that I want to live in." I want to live in a world where I buy things from people who have a face, a family, fears and hopes, art, joy, and tragedy.
I cannot feel, hear, smell, or otherwise sense a person on the computer screen, so I tend only to do my nasty multinational corporation financing stuff online.
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michweek Posted 4:21 am
08 May 2007
Living
I find its far more enjoyable and less of a stress to go shopping where I see friends behind the counters and have lovely conversations, unlike my mothers stressful, fast passed, long line, grumpy shopping on her lunch break at Costco.
Ew! Bulk shopping where the foods already bad and now you need to eat it in under a week!
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south end press Posted 12:30 pm
08 May 2007
Taking the book as an example
Since many of the comments are using buying books as their case study and we are a publisher (South End Press) I started thinking about the different paths from us to you and the impacts of that path.
I'm a bit of a book geek so I thought other people might be interested. Here are the usual paths our books take.
I think this is pretty accurate for most publishers (well except for me biking books to the LPC). So I guess in conclusion, like most hings, the lower you buy on the food chain the lower your impact. Another thing to consider is your shipping method. The more expedited your shipment the more airplanes involved.
A. Shortest path--lowest impact
- Books ship from the printer (union printer in Quebec, Canada) to our office in Cambridge, MA
- I put some books in my bag and ride to the bookstore where I volunteer
- You take the T to the store for an event and buy some books
B. Pretty short path- Books ship to office as in A
- You order from our website or by mail
- We mail the book to you
C. The independent bookstore path- Books ship to our distributor warehouse in TN
- Books shipped to bookstore
- You bike to the store to get your book
(fine print: sometimes there is another wholesaler between the distributor and the store)D. The online bookseller path
- Books ship to distributor
- Books shipped to online bookseller warehouse
- Books shipped to you
(fine print: as in C)E. The chain bookseller
- Books ship to distributor
- Books shipped to bookstore warehouse
- Books shipped to bookstore
- You go to the store and get the book
--alexander--->Permalink
JohnnyT Posted 8:32 pm
08 May 2007
www.cubalaya.com
I read the article on online shopping, and would like to recommend a great site I just used- www.cubalaya.com
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floorgoblin Posted 6:48 am
09 May 2007
Addendum to the book chain post
After having worked at a chain bookseller, let me revise slightly:
E. The chain bookseller
1. Books ship to distributor
2. Books shipped to bookstore warehouse
3. For each store, the needed stock is assessed and shipped in bulk, i.e. 200 of Book A is shipped to store X.
4. Book A sells at store X, overstock is assessed if they don't sell as well as predicted (happens often).
5. Overstock is sent back to warehouse (complete book if a hardcover, for softcovers the cover is torn off and shipped in order to account for all books, and the actual book is destroyed.)
6. At warehouse, returned books are shipped to new stores if needed, or returned to distributor if overstock exists in all locations.
7. Not sure what the distributors do with extra books, presumably try to sell them or ship them to new stores.
Chain stores have a bit longer of a "shipment chain" than other types of bookstores.
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jodii66 Posted 5:25 am
19 May 2007
Online shopping
I work with Yves Rocher and we have both online and instore shopping. The difference with us as far as instore goes is that we only receive shipments once a week to reduce environmental impact, we send back and reuse the bags that our products were shipped in, we sell our own reuseable shopping bags (where money goes to natural conservation in Canada), we use recycled material in packaging (and offer refillable containers on some product), to name just a few things we do to lesson the companies environmental impact. I know my store uses environmelly concious lighting and heating (our mall uses Bullfrog Power).
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wayneluke Posted 7:21 am
11 Jul 2007
Book Stores
The local landscape would determine where you buy as well. I live in a twin-city area of about 300,000 people in Southern California. Los Angeles is 45 miles southwest of my area but I really don't like going there. In my twin-city area, we have 2 bookstores. A Barnes & Noble about 10 miles away and a Waldenbooks (owned by borders) about 3 miles away. Occasionally someone opens a used bookstore but they rarely last and usually only contain romance novels. Almost anytime, I want to get a book it has to be ordered off a website and shipped. Waldensbooks and Barnes and Noble with do this for you or I can do it at home. Our local governments seem to love big boxes though. We have 4 super Walmarts and a 5th is being built. Doubles and Triplicates of any chain out there in the area as well. Just no bookstores.
Sometimes I miss commuting to Glendale for work because along the main street there are a dozen bookstores with everything one could want.
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Tifetup Posted 1:01 am
12 Oct 2007
UPS - Shared shipping?
Umbra I love your stuff!
I totally agree with the jury being out. It seems really hard to account for all the factors.
For instance:
I work in NYC and get stuff shipped to my office. I'm thinking that since UPS is always driving around the city that my package is technically sharing the same journey with other packages incoming to my office. It shares the same truck that traverses the city. All those packages came from the same hub which came from the hub near (insert online company here, i.e. Amazon.) AND I assume "Amazon" is constantly sending a bunch load of packages to the UPS center near it. So my package is never really alone, is it? whew!
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