In 2008, local journalist and activist Sarah Brown launched Green Alliance (GA) with the aim of connecting sustainability-minded consumers with businesses committed to reducing their environmental impact.

Nearly 100 businesses and close to 3,000 consumer members later, Brown and the GA are well on their way to making that dream a reality.

Now, the fast-growing organization is setting its sights on helping their partnering businesses more effectively connect with one another and garner the tools necessary to maintain a successful green business.

On January 25th, the GA will host the first in a series of unique educational events at their new 75 Congress Street headquarters. The workshops – which will include wine and light appetizers – are free for existing Green Alliance Business Partners, just $25 for Green Alliance Community members and $50 for any business owner or employee that is not a Green Alliance Green Card holder (this fee includes a one year GA membership).

Designed to help foster idea-sharing and creative marketing strategies, the workshops promise to add yet another unique wrinkle to an already unique GA tapestry.

“We’ve always been very effective at being a kind of clearinghouse for green businesses and consumers in NH, ME and Ma,” explains GA Director Brown. “But we’ve realized lately that the businesses themselves are an enormous wealth of knowledge, and that we should be fostering the sharing of that knowledge for the benefit of everyone.”

Truth be told, Brown’s idea for a fresh, new take on the traditional business-to-business workshop wasn’t hers alone.

This past summer, Brown – eager to put a fresh pair of eyes about the GA model – was introduced to Bridget Sprague. With over 10 years of high profile marketing experience – Stride Rite, General Motors, and Green Alliance Business Partner Pixels & Pulp being just a few examples of past clients – Sprague struck Brown as the perfect person to help take her growing but still infant GA to the next level.

In fact, Sprague was so intrigued by the GA’s one-of-a-kind business model, she decided to offer her own services (under the title Be Good Branding) to the organization. All she asked for in return was a small office, and the opportunity to build out her resume.

Needless to say, Brown was sold.

“Having Bridget come on was an unbelievably good shot in the arm for our company,” recalls Brown. “She put on the radar things we hadn’t even thought of before – our branding, our messaging, how we interact with our Green Alliance community and business prospects. Without her, we would’ve been stuck in the same old way of doing things for who knows how long.”

A few months later, a second angel would make her way to Brown and the GA’s front door.

Mirjam IJTsma first caught wind of the Green Alliance when, in 2010, the Netherlands native moved to Derry, in the process commissioning Ridgeview Construction (a GA Business Partner) to build her new home. Having herself worked for years as a Human Resources (HR) specialists – focusing on fostering what she refers to as a company’s “cultural chemistry” – IJtsma was intrigued by Ridgeview owner Shane Carter’s involvement with the GA, and the underlying values the organization’s businesses seemed to hold in common.

Shortly thereafter, IJTsma launched a new boutique consulting company, aptly named Cultural Chemistry.

Today, IJtsma is not only a GA Business Partner herself; she’s also made it her goal to help the organization achieve precisely what she advocates, namely a positive, dynamic, and forward-thinking workplace environment.

Appropriately, IJtsma is slated to host the first GA Workshop later this month. Needless to say, it’s an opportunity she’s looking forward to with equal parts pride and aplomb.

“The goal of the first workshop will be to try and engage all of these companies to help them better identify their own green vision,” IJtsma explains. “We want the employers themselves to understand why engagement on green initiatives is important, why that helps the GA community and community at large, and how best to engage employees in that very vision.”

Then on February 22nd, Bridget Sprague will take the stage to discuss effective green branding, brand-building, and effective messaging within a company.

On March 28th, Elise Weeks and Meghan Keogh of Pixels & Pulp – who originally introduced Sprague to Brown and the GA – will offer up their expertise on the art of effective branding. It’s something the duo knows a little something about, having designed the GA’s website and developed the organization’s early branding strategy.

Like IJTsma, Sprague sees the workshops as an opportunity for GA Business Partners, consumer members, and other community stalwarts to better coordinate and facilitate the growing trend towards green, local commerce.

“We want to make it so that these businesses aren’t just telling people about their business – what they do, what they sell – but to actually give information that everyone can use to immediately improve how they’re doing business and how they’re reaching the community,” explains Sprague. “It’s about bringing people together and helping green businesses succeed, and about showing how others have been successful at doing just that.”

And that, says Sprague, will go a long way in helping take the Green Alliance – and its near 100 partnering businesses – to the next level.

“The idea being that, if you grow the whole, everyone grows.”

For more info on the Green Business Learning Series or to join the GA to attend the series visit www.greenalliance.biz/seminars or email Sarah@greenalliance.biz or call 603-817-4694

To learn more about Cultural Chemistry go to www.culturalchemistry.com
To find out about Pixels & Pulp visit www.pixelsandpulp.com