By Alliance Communications Coordinator Amy Durr
For many, the holidays are joyful, sparkling, and heartwarming. Family and friends, expressions of love, special food and meaningful traditions make your world feel a bit more magical. At least until you put out the celebration-aftermath trash and receive the post-holiday bills.
Here are some shocking numbers from what I call the January Holiday Fallout:
- Consumers expect to spend an average of $1,778 on holiday-related purchases this year.
- Total consumption and spending on food, travel, lighting, and gifts over three days of holiday festivities in December results in as much as 650 kg of carbon dioxide emissions (CO2) per person — equivalent to the weight of 1,000 Christmas puddings — or 5.5% of our total annual carbon footprint.
- During the time between Thanksgiving and New Year’s, Americans throw away 25% more trash, resulting in 25 million tons of waste.
One easy way to get back to the delight the holidays hold is to add sustainability to your To-Do list. Eco-friendly holidays save you money, support local businesses, build meaningful traditions and encourage creativity.
We were so taken by the great job Meredith O’Connor did for Avocado Magazine laying out how you can have a more joyous and greener holiday that we wanted to share the highlights with you in her words. We loved their take on honoring the earth during the holidays by protecting natural resources, generating less waste, and reducing your carbon footprint. That’s what Alliance President Terry Gips likes to call a win-win-win!
Avocado’s Easy Ways to Make the Holidays More Sustainable
- Consume More Consciously – Shop locally whenever possible, which reduces the environmental costs of transportation and packaging while supporting jobs and health in your community.
If you order online, look for brands with third-party certifications that validate their positive impact, like B Corp, Climate Neutral or 1% For the Planet. - Ditch The Wrapping Paper – The US gift-wrapping market is expected to reach $7 billion by 2025. That’s a lot of money for something that typically gets ripped open and immediately thrown away — creating an enormous amount of single-use waste.
Instead, upcycle newspaper, brown paper, or recycled cardboard boxes and wrap them in twine and dried herbs, all of which are compostable.
(Editor: Or try Japanese furoshiki wrapping cloth with tons of fun options.)
- Help Protect The Environment – Do good for the planet and protect our most vulnerable ecosystems by adopting a coral reef, restoring coastal mangroves, or planting a tree in one of our national forests in the name of a friend or loved one.
(Editor: Or join or make a donation to an environmental group doing work you love, like the Alliance!) - Reduce Food Waste – If you’re hosting or attending a holiday dinner, plan ahead to keep perfectly good starters, sides, and mains out of the garbage.
First, determine how many people are attending your gathering and cook for that number — don’t go overboard with the spread. Have extra to-go containers ready for guests to take leftovers home. Turn any remaining dishes into something new. - Swap Plastic Garland for Fruit – Grab a bag of fresh cranberries or dried cherries, and string them with a needle and thread for a touch of color on your mantle, door frame, or tree. Compost them in January.
(Editor: Many holiday decorations are made out of plastic, including favorites like eco-unfriendly tinsel, garland and ribbons/bows.)
- Invest In LED Lights – The glimmer of lights is a key part of the magic of the holidays. Incandescent bulbs use 75% more electricity, get hot, and cause light pollution.
Invest in LED versions of your favorite string of bulbs. LED lights last longer and are a safer option because they don’t get very hot. - Resist Returns – When gifts get returned and shipped back to the store, they rack up carbon emissions on the journey, creating approximately 15 million tons of carbon emissions annually. And oftentimes, these products aren’t put back on shelves — an estimated five million tons of returns end up in landfills each year.
If your family or friend group isn’t about to jump on the no-gift bandwagon anytime soon, get everyone to send a list of items they’d really love to receive. When in doubt, get someone a gift card so they can purchase exactly what they want. In the event that you are gifted something you don’t care for or need, regift or donate it to cut back on waste.
(Editor: And don’t forget there are great Buy-Nothing and gifting Facebook, Freecycle and other groups where you can find someone who really wants your unwanted gift!)
- Make Your Cards Digital – In the US, we send 1.3 billion holiday cards each year. All that mail generates enough CO2 emissions to charge 22 billion smartphones or 22,000 homes’ energy use for one year.
Consider going digital. Websites like Paperless Post, Greenvelope, and Evite offer tons of festive digital card templates with the option to personalize them with messages, artwork, and photos. - Spend Time Together –The greatest gift for holidays is love for yourself and others. The bonds you create with those who exist today are what give us the most meaning in our lives.
So rather than showing up with an armful of gifts, plan a fun outing like a walk at a park, an ice skating adventure, or a cookie-making date.
(Editor: Or give the gift of a concert, membership or class that you can enjoy together.)
We love Avocado because it’s a Certified B Corporation® and makes great organic certified bedding products (GOTS-certified organic mattresses, luxury pillows and bedding, and quality American-made bed frames and furniture), while providing valuable sustainability information for their customers and the public.
We think it’s important that Avocado is making green look great through its magazine and both TV and print advertising. They’re one of the few companies that are really out there promoting sustainability.
Avocado’s mission is to be the world’s most sustainable brand. They donate one percent of mattress revenue to environmental nonprofits through their membership with 1% For The Planet, which we feel is an important way for businesses to make a difference. Their dream is a world united by sustainability and social responsibility, a dream we share as well.