I expounded the values of niche marketing and the parallels between what we started at WEVO in 1996 and what Duffy initiated in 2009.

On the first steps to fame, Duffy has cracked a nice mention he on the 70% website, headlining above Raymond Blanc no less!

A visit to Redstarchocolate.co.uk will leave you slightly underwhelmed today (march 8th 2010), although I would encourage you all to inundate Duffy with orders and help his niche business gain the momentum that any purveyor of fine chocolates deserves – especially the 2nd largest in the UK!?!?

Well done to Duffy for bringing glorious flavor chocolates to the market, doing so in a sustainable manner and with a social conscience of how the real cost of the product is rationalized for all concerned from bean to bar…..

It will now be interesting to see if the oak that grows from Duffy’s acorn can ever provide the building materials for his windmill to grind the beans.

In Part 1. of the packaging manifesto, I illustrated how careful we are about using recycled packing materials and how we recycle cardboard, re-use boxes, boxes made from post consumer materials etc, etc.

So if you have ever received a package from WEVO and the first thing you noticed is how the abundance of thick Ziploc bags seems to contradict our packaging manifesto, please let me illustrate.

It’s not all that it appears. We have an obligation to our customers to careful pack our expensive parts and deliver them with the cosmetic finish unblemished. Years ago we discovered that 4 MIL thick bags offer us the best protection of metal parts packed together. Ziploc’d bags offer the greatest convenience. A 4 MIL, zip lock bag is by no means our cheapest option, or the most environmentally friendly.

Second use is what it’s all about, we send you a heavy duty plastic bag so durable, so re-usable, that you now have a decent bag to store the O.E. parts that were replaced by the WEVO products you recently purchased.

We often receive parts shipped from other small companies, packaged in plastic sandwich bags (about 1/4 the thickness – 1 MIL). Good for nothing really except sandwiches - often chaffed through, no further service life available, all the embodied energy wasted on a single inadequate use……

So next time, or the first time you get your package from WEVO with one or more nice 4 MIL plastic Ziploc bags, go ahead and re-use it, or save it for that project when you can.  Please don’t throw it away after our single use….. give in to the organizer’s compulsion. These bags are a great way to organize your parts safely and securely. We have some 4 MIL bags with parts stored over 10 years ago, parts zipped safely inside still ready and waiting to get back onto a Porsche one day.

The implementation of the first Carbon Cap in the USA by California State Government in 2006 (http://gov.ca.gov/press-release/4111/) also continues to show how CA is leading the way for other states – particularly on a topic where I feel the USA generally falls far behind.

 I was reminded of what reckless, gluttonous and pain-free energy consumers we are in California when my recent trip to Holland exposed me first hand to the $8.55/gal fuel prices……. There is plenty of scope for carbon capping, just look anywhere for a place to start.

In our own way Windrush is  involved in re-cycling. Although tenuous, providing the Porsche car hobbyist with parts for the continued use and enjoyment of old vehicles has multiple positives of keeping the non-recyclable parts from landfill, plus maintain the deployment of the embodied energy used in creating these old beauties. Granted, the tailpipe emissions from an old gross offender MFI equipped 911 are pretty horrendous, but driven infrequently, I take comfort that the total carbon footprint of my 1972 911, is far less than the commuter Prius zipping past twice a day on it’s 60 miles commute on the nearby Bayshore Freeway.

Our packaging manifesto – slightly self indulgent, but in a positive way.

• Save and re-use all bubble-wrap
• Save and re-use all paper packaging
• Save and re-use all packing peanuts
• Save and re-use all serviceable cardboard boxes
• Recycle all excess cardboard box
• Minimize landfill garbage

Since we started shipping WEVO label products in 1998, we have never purchased a single “peanut” for packaging, nor a foot of bubble wrap. We re-cycle every piece of incoming paper packaging, bubble wrap and packing peanuts. We re-use about 40% of the incoming cardboard boxes we receive from vendors, we send all other cardboard to recycling. We recycle all plastic, glass and metal containers  and the new shipping boxes we buy are made from post-consumer recycled cardboard.

So if you receive a package from WEVO that looks like it has seen some previous shipping duty – it probably has! Do the right thing, please re-use it, or recycle it.