In these lean times, eBay is hoping to persuade you to spend some of your hard earned dollars with them by pushing a more sustainable model of shopping they’re marketing as part of their project Green Team, though you might not initially realize it upon visiting their website. Despite the 1,000 plus employees that are helping to make this eco-initiative possible, the invitation to visit the Green Team site is only given a small tab on the upper right hand corner of the eBay home page – hardly a stunning endorsement on the part of the management. Still, once you manage to it to make it to the destination, you’ll find their heart to be mostly in the right place.
Since the very beginning, eBay’s entire business relied almost exclusively on one of the main tenants of the green lifestyle – the idea of “reuse” – and though they never made a point of trumpeting this as an environmentally conscious model per say, they do now. Their newest effort builds upon the notion of buying pre-owned as “green” and takes it into the realm of new merchandise, offering alternative consumer guides for sustainable and energy saving products, in addition to providing users with forums to share their eco-friendly living tips. The site also suggests ways that businesses and individual sellers can minimize their footprint through reducing waste, recycling and utilizing smarter shipping methods – nothing revolutionary, but commendable for making this information accessible to existing eBay users in one convenient place.
The most important detail of the Green Team site, however, might be the attention it can bring to other ongoing eBay initiatives, most notably Giving Works – a way to donate a portion of sales to nonprofit causes – and MicroPlace – a micro lending service that supports sustainable development.
[via TreeHugger]
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