Is green really the new black? In 2006, $32.8 billion was spent on healthy and eco-friendly food, beverage, personal care, and household products. In 2008, $7 billion was spent on natural and organic personal care products alone. And the natural household products category is projected to grow to $1.48 billion in 2011 (an increase of 119% from 2006).
Apparently, even in today’s economy, green is the new green.
But that doesn’t mean it has to cost you more money to go there. As demand grows and the supply of sustainable materials gets stronger, the cost of eco-friendly products goes down until they compete with the mainstream stand-bys on the shelves.
A few months ago, I tested organic versus conventional kids’ lunches and found six cents difference in favor of the organic version: Check out the video to see how that breaks down. By now you’d probably save a whole dime to go green at lunchtime, and you’d certainly prevent your kids from ingesting a whole heckuva lot of pesticides.
But the fastest way to go green and save some green at the same time? Make your own.
DIY FASHION
Denim trends change faster than lip color—but tossing your jeans because they’re last year’s boot cut means you’re adding to the four millions tons of textile waste that hit our landfills every year, according to TextileRecycle.org. Instead, reincarnate them for pennies by turning them into something eco-fabulous, following step-by-step instructions from Born-Again Vintage: 25 Ways to Deconstruct, Reinvent and Recycle Your Wardrobe (Potter Craft, December 2008). With one pair of jeans, you get three new additions to your wardrobe, with little more cost than thread (and elbow grease). First, cut off the legs, seam rip the center seam and fray the cuff to make a cute mini. Next, take one of the discarded legs, turn it inside out and sew up the sides. Add a zipper and strap and you’ve got a retro denim tote. With the leftovers, make a headband accented by a tricked-out denim flower. And you thought your sewing skills maxed out in seventh grade Home Ec.
HAUT LIPGLOSS AT HUMBLE PRICES
Got a double boiler, an organic mint candy and a beet? You’ve got the season’s hottest eco-friendly lip gloss, according to eHow. You’ll need:
Beeswax
Sweet almond oil
Double boiler
A Vitamin E capsule
An organic mint hard candy
Essential oil (optional)
A fresh beet
A small sealable container
Melt 2 tsp. of beeswax and 2 tbsp. of cold pressed or extra virgin sweet almond oil in a double boiler. It is important that you heat the mixture slowly, as excess temperatures can destroy the healing elements of natural oils. Make sure that the mixture never gets so hot that it is uncomfortable to touch.
Remove from heat and stir in two to four drops of oil squeezed from a vitamin E capsule. Vitamin E has antioxidant properties that will nourish and protect your lips, but it is also a natural preservative for your natural lip gloss.
Melt a very small piece of organic peppermint candy into the wax and oil mixture.
Slice a piece of raw beet and add it to the mixture. Add more or less depending on how deep you want the color, but make sure to fish out the pieces before it cools. The amount of dye you add to your lip gloss will depend on your personal choice; however, you should make the shade in the pot slightly darker than the desired finished color.
Stir the mixture occasionally as you allow it to cool. While still slightly warm, transfer your natural lip gloss into a small sealable container, allowing it to cool completely before sealing.
A CLEAN HOUSE FOR PENNIES
I’m addicted to Susan Carpenter’s Realist Idealist column in the Los Angeles Times, mainly because she’s so damned skeptical it makes me laugh. But last week’s column—about four simple, environmentally friendly ingredients that can clean your house from top to bottom—made her a believer.
The truth is, our grandmothers cleaned with white distilled vinegar, baking soda, castile soap and water for hundreds of years until the chemical industry began marketing expensive alternatives, which resulted in 85,000 new chemicals into our households over the past 50 years, according to Healthy Child, Healthy World. No wonder our kids have asthma.
Susan bought a $2 bottle of white distilled vinegar (a disinfectant and deodorant), $1 worth of baking soda (a deodorant and mild abrasive) and a $10 jug of castile soap (made of 100% vegetable oil). With a little water, she mixed it up in recycled cleaning product containers and scrubbed away at windows, toilets, tubs, floors and sinks. Adding a squeeze of lemon juice (a disinfectant) and a dash of olive oil (a lubricant) to the castile soap, she dusted and shined her wood furniture. That’s a $13 investment that yields materials to keep your house clean for months.
What are your money-saving tips in the fashion, beauty or lifestyle departments? Do any of them happen to be green, too? Tell me about it!
