Individuals aren’t the only ones seeking to conquer their debt. Businesses too must come to terms with their spending and eliminate any and all waste in order to maximize profits and stay afloat.
As part of its makeover series, Fortune Small Business sends specialists to one small company in order to provide cost-saving recommendations. Absolute Tile & Stone in St. Louis is FSB’s current focus.
One of the key points in the feature on Absolute Tile & Stone is how the company can save money by going green. Jean Ponzi, green resources manager at EarthWays Center, suggests that the company find a way to reuse or recycle thousands of pounds of stone remnants that currently go to landfill.
“Zero waste is a sustainability principle,” Ponzi says. “So you need to find uses for these pieces of stone.” She suggests that Absolute sign up with a local industrial-materials exchange, an online listings service that pairs waste producers with waste users.
“You’d have to sell at a low price, and there may be transportation costs, but hopefully you’d spend less than you do for disposal,” she says.
The demand for Absolute’s waste could be great. Several emerging firms make green countertops out of composite materials. The use of these coutertops can satisfy a green building guideline established by the U.S. Green Building Council’s LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certification system, which awards points to builders who use local scrap materials.