How to Organize the Eco-Friendly Way

April showers bring May flowers; April blogs bring you eco-friendly tips & tricks!

This Earth Month, we want to bring you some of the best ways to get organized while keeping our planet healthy. Let’s start simple. If you've heard it once, you've heard it a thousand times: reduce, re-use, recycle. These three R's are in order of importance and impact to our planet, and can be applied to organizing!

Reduce

The first way to make a positive environmental impact is to reduce your consumption in general, but especially of single-use or toxic materials. This means lessening your use of plastics and harsh chemicals as well as trying to reduce your carbon footprint by making behavioral changes like driving less, eating fewer animal products, or buying fewer things online.

Reducing is also a great principle for getting and staying organized! Even if you've been able to create a really effective organizational system, if your household is continuing to bring in new items all the time, the system will be disrupted. One of my favorite parts of organizing is helping clients understand what they already have so that they don't need to buy more. This will save you money, reduce waste from items that you purchased and forgot about, and de-clutter your space so that you only have what you really want and need.

Re-Use

Before you buy, see if you can re-use what you have! This applies to all kinds of different categories. It is so easy to buy things, and a lot of items are available for very low prices. Try to take an extra moment (or even day or two) to think about if you really want an item before clicking that "purchase" button. Unneeded clutter has an impact on your physical space, mental bandwidth, and the environment.

There is often a need for new-to-you items like clothing, toys, and craft supplies. We are lucky to live in an area that has a really robust secondhand marketplace in many different forms. There are plenty of Goodwill, Salvation Army, and Savers stores to peruse for whatever you may need, along with Buy Nothing or local Everything is Free pages for items in good condition that need a new home. Before browsing Ikea or Amazon for an item you've been thinking about buying, consider saving money and carbon emissions by checking out Craigslist or Facebook Marketplace!

This principle also applies to organizing supplies. We love the Container Store and have lots of recommendations for great organizing products from Amazon, but you will be able to find a lot of these pre-owned, as well. And don't forget about our favorite principle - the SPACE method: Sort, Purge, Assign, Contain, Equalize. If you're thinking about starting to get organized, do not go out and buy bins first! Containing, whether in fresh bins or used ones, is the second-to-last step. I can't tell you how many storage products I have purged with clients who purchased them with the hope of getting organized. Less is more!

Recycle

Last, but certainly not least, is recycling. Curbside recycling is common in most municipalities and is a great option for reducing waste, but it still needs to be done mindfully. Not everything can be recycled, and certain items need to be recycled at specific sites. The most important thing, that very few people know, is that anything that you are putting into a recycling bin needs to be clean and free of food residue. Dirty or greasy items contaminate clean recycling and burden the infrastructure.

"Wishcycling" is the the act of disposing of consumer waste in a recycling bin in hopes of it being recycled, when it cannot or is unlikely to be recycled. It might make you feel better, but it is worse for the world! When in doubt, throw it out.

If you aren't sure how to recycle an item, Earth 911 is a great resource for finding alternative recycling options in your area. Textiles and electronics are the two most common categories that we support our clients in disposing in an environmentally friendly way. If you want to see a list of local options, check out our Disposal Resources page!

If all of this seems like too much to handle, give us a call! Our team is committed to getting you organized and purged sustainably and joyfully.