Jack of All Trades or Industry Leader?

The "Green Industry" is in the goldrush stage. Right now there is a rush for companies to be green, to become green, to get green and to figure out if green is worthwhile. As companies grapple with the green revolution there has emerged a whole industry of green consultants and sustainability experts.

Like any emerging industry (think the dot.com rush) there are those who know what they are doing and those that are riding the wave, hoping to cash in. One of the trends that is interesting is the one stop shop, the consultants that offer everything from energy audits to sustainable purchasing plans to waste audits. These companies are experts in everything and offer a complete solution to your "green needs". Now we are not going to name any companies here (Google search: sustainable business or "green consulting") but we offer the following food for thought.

1. How are you an expert in everything? Other than some 14 year olds that I've met there doesen't seem to be too many experts in multiple fields. You might find someone that knows a lot about many things but they are likely not the top expert in every field. Keystone only does waste consulting, if you need someone to tell you how to save money on your energy bills we're not the folks to ask. If you want to save money on waste and reduce the amount of waste you produce please give us a call.

2. Have they really done it? Like, REALLY DONE IT?

There is a big difference between being pretty sure you would be able to do a waste audit if a client needed one (it's garbage, how hard can it be?) and actually having done it. Keystone does waste audits every day, we know what to look for, when to dig deeper and how to get results. The Environmental Waste Solutions system that we use has been in use since 1994 with thousands of audits completed all over North America.

3. How much does it cost? What if it doesn't work?

Most (not all) consultants charge a fee for their work in a business model where they provide recomendations in return for a fee. It's a knowledge exchange transaction. The consultant has expertise that they will apply to your business for a fee. This is a good idea because it's cheaper to pay them to apply their knowledge than for you or your staff to learn this knowledge. Pretty basic, they do the work and they expect to get paid. However there are a few problems with this model.

First of all the knowledge they give you is then yours to implement. This is fine as the knowledge is what you paid for. However, the implementing can require a whole lot more knowledge and skill.

For example, a green consultant says to you if your recycled your newspaper you would save $5,000 per year. They provide the name of the company that recycles newspaper, and you call them. Sounds good right?

So you call the newspaper company.....and then the questions begin. How much newspaper do you produce???? We will pay you X amount for this paper? (is this a good price? should we ask for more? what is the current market?) How often would you like your paper picked up?? What size bin do you need? Please sign our contract, don't worry about the fine print, it's a standard contract....

Keystone is different. First of all we don't charge an upfront fee. Why not? Well, we really don't feel right charging you for something that we're not sure about. What do we mean we're not sure? Well our business is based on saving money for our clients through reducing waste costs. And those savings are variable, some clients save 50% some clients save 33%, some clients save 0%. Our fee is based on a percentage of your savings, the more you save the better for us and the better for the client. We are also commited to makeing recomendations that we know will work for our clients. Why? Because if the don't, we don't get paid. Now a traditional consultant will get paid no matter what because the recomendations are paid for before they are implemented. They may not get the repeat business if their recomendations are a complete flop but they get paid for the intial recomendations.

So the choice is yours, go with a "green consultant" who may or may not be an expert in the field of waste consulting, pay upfront and hope that the plan works or....

Go with Keystone who is proven expert in the field of waste consulting and know that they will only get paid if their plan works..