What’s Next For Green Cleaning?

Now that green cleaning has gone mainstream, what is next for the cleaning industry and its customers?

In the early days of green initiatives, manufacturers, distributors, and cleaning contractors that offered green-certified products or services separated themselves from their competition. This environmental spirit turned into a business advantage.

Today, the industry is more focused on sustainability and organizations are opting for products and procedures that ensure natural resources are used wisely. According to reports from Steve Ashkin, president of The Ashkin Group, businesses are also examining their own operations.

As he reported to Environmental Leader, the business case for sustainability that is now making its way through the professional cleaning industry is led by customer demand. Organizations around the world are doing business with vendors based on their sustainability practices.

According to the Governance and Accountability Institute:
“Sustainability reporting rose dramatically from 2011, when roughly 20 percent of [Standard & Poor’s 500] companies published reports, to 72 percent just [two] years later in 2013. From 2013 to 2017, the frequency of reporting has increased each year, now up to 85 percent of companies reporting in 2017.”

When major companies begin asking about their vendors’ sustainability practices, it has a powerful impact on purchasing

Another thing affecting sustainability efforts is the resiliency that comes with sustainability, the article said.

The organizations whose facilities survive major weather events — such as Hurricane Florence —are the ones that are more sustainability focused –using hybrid cars or solar power to run their facilities. Sustainability helps minimize risk and is simply smart business.

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