And the Green Businesses of the Year award goes to…
Greetings! We can't reveal who wins Green Biz of the Year until the Community Awards! Read on for the finalists and of course we will have a full recap in our next edition.
So many of you showed up for the viewing of the documentary Xtrillion at the MAC this week. It was great to see such an engaged audience who all saw the gravity of our plastic conundrum. If you feel so moved and can spare a day to go to Springfield to lobby for legislation to reduce plastic waste, see the notice below for Lobby Day on March 20! No transportation? We got you covered!
Show support for Soccer for Zambia helping girls play soccer by rounding up some new or gently-used leggings. And head to SportSwap on Sunday at 1 pm!
Next week we are looking forward to Glen Ellyn awarding the first ever Green Business of the Year at the GE Chamber of Commerce Community Awards Ceremony on Tuesday, March 11. We have been collaborating with the Chamber on this award for over a year, and are honored to present the winner next week! We are also up for Non-Profit of the Year together with some amazing nominees.
Karin Daly, co-founder, Jacquelyn Casazza, president/co-founder and Angela Powell, director of operations
We were absolutely thrilled to be named a finalist for the Non-Profit of the Year for the Glen Ellyn Community Awards. Also nominated are the American Legion Post #3 who brought the Vietnam Memorial traveling wall to GE and the always entertaining Buffalo Theatre Ensemble from COD.
LEARN
Glen Ellyn Community Awards
For the first time in its 61 year history, a Green Business of the Year will be named at the Glen Ellyn Community Awards! Go Green Glen Ellyn worked with the Chamber of Commerce to develop criteria and establish this award. Kudos to GGGE Board members Barbara Kwiatkowsky and Renae Frigo who honed the criteria so businesses could be fairly evaluated.
The Green Business of the Year Award was first discussed with the Chamber Awards committee over a year ago. Go Green GE, with input from the Village Environmental Commission and the GE Chamber of Commerce, created a list of criteria that local businesses could use to evaluate their own sustainable practices. Criteria included areas like waste reduction, energy, green cleaning, community impact, and others, in an effort to capture as many areas as possible. As part of the Chamber's award process, members of the community nominated establishments and at the end of voting there were 15 nominees for the Green Business of the Year! Based on the criteria for the award and the input from the community nominations, three finalists were selected
a la' main apothecary & refillery
Re-New
Drip Yoga
Each of these amazing businesses has put their own spin on sustainability. a la' main sells 'clean' home and personal care products in sustainable and in most cases, refillable packaging. Re-New uses upcycled textiles and works with the refugee community to train women to create beautiful hand-crafted merchandise like purses, bags, wallets and more. Drip Yoga has created a vibrant yoga community and supports them by using green cleaning products and energy saving appliances and does not sell (despite requests!) plastic water bottles to its patrons.
We encourage all Glen Ellyn businesses to commit to being greener -- and we are happy to support you in any way we can!
DO
You to-dos this week!
Get your tickets to the Glen Ellyn Community Awards.
Want to reduce single-use plastic in Illinois? Sign up to go to Lobby Day for an energizing day meeting with our legislators, joined by advocates from all over the state! It's on March 20. A very generous donor has offered to support transportation for our group, and we still have four open slots!
SportSwap! Collect sporting equipment from your basement, closets and garage for SportSwap!
Break out your bicycles and hit Bike Glen Ellyn's first slow roll ride of the year -- March 21 at 6 pm.
Take the EBDRT survey to advocate for a greenway trail!