A Deal To Motivate You In Today's Digital Era

In honor of today's workshop, we want to invite our readers to sign up for one of the super star tools we use and recommend, Constant Contact. Sign up for a 60 day free trial and then receive $30 credit on your first month by following the steps in this link >

It is time you harness the tools available in this digital era. Stop blaming the economy for the lack of growth in your business. Work smarter, faster, better on reaching your buyers and building your reputation. Try electronic newsletters, electronic invitations and save money, be green, and see results in a click!

To earn the $30 credit, you must enter the site through the link provided above. As a full disclaimer, The Midas Center will also receive a discount. However, we would not recommend a product or service just for the money, we do it because we like to promote everything that is awesome.

And the Green Award Goes to... Drum Roll Please...

The Indiana Green Awards Gala was Thursday, March 25th in Indianapolis. The Midas Center owner, Andrea Cook was selected as a finalist for Indy Green Fest's Indiana Green Entrepreneur of the Year. The room oozed with green entrepreneurs and grand leaders of social change of global proportions. The awards were given to much deserved professionals who truly earned the Lorax love and noble recognition. Andrea claims she isn't quite as dedicated as the Lorax but she's proud to not be the Onceler either (although she has been known to buy sneeds from time to time.)

The real awards went to the well deserved and duly dedicated recipients. The Midas Center is proud to have shared the evening with a group of divine minds! For example, the award winner of Reduced Waste was given to Fort Wayne Metals. Members from their organization are pictured below. This company is innovative in how they handle waste. One of the many projects they are working on involves searching for a salad packaging company so that they can reuse the wastes exuded from fish, a waste that provides energy as a great fertilizer in salad green nurseries. Their company disposes only trash that has been tainted with foods. This company inspires other business owners to look for ways to make a difference and Fort Wayne Metals is highly deserving of their award. Kudos Bruce, Lyndsey and Nate, leaders of social change!

Another notable item worth mentioning from the event is that Culver Tri Kappa was recognized as an award finalist! Chairs for Charity was selected as a finalist for the Indiana Green Award for Outstanding Community Project of the Year.

The judges were searching for a sustainable project providing a positive impact for the community and the environment and Chairs for Charity provided something that met the criteria.

Tri Kappa is a sorority dedicated to promoting culture, charity and education within the statewide borders of Indiana. With currently 146 active and 119 associate Tri Kappa chapters, Tri Kappa has a rich philanthropic history of leading programs, events and services to improve the lives of many. The Culver Tri Kappa active chapter includes a membership of over 30 active women leaders who strive to make a difference in their surrounding community.

This year was a remarkable moment for Culver Tri Kappa. Celebrating their 50th Anniversary, the group of community leaders also launched their most successful fundraiser to date, raising over $10,000 in a time when the economy was in a downturn. The inaugural Chairs for Charity program promoted culture and raised money to support charities and is being recognized as a leading finalist in the Indiana Green Business Award as the Outstanding Community Project of the Year because of its community-wide awareness and prevention of repurposing 74 chairs for the sake of art and not sending the pile of chairs to the landfills.

Culver Tri Kappa’s Chairs for Charity called for creative community members to find a chair for a dumpster or where ever and repurpose it, recreating a chair into a masterpiece. The chairs were then donated and distributed throughout the town’s businesses to be showcased in a Chair Parade. Over 25 businesses participated. Throughout the month of June, people would experience these decorative chairs using the town-wide maps. At the close of the month, the parade ended and the chairs were marched to a reception hall where they were sold during a live Auction Gala. Over two hundred people, including the artists attended the gala and were all pleased with the outcome as the highest paying bidders carried their creative chairs to their homes. These 74 chairs are now each sitting comfortably in people’s homes and not in an over-capacitated landfill.

Chairs for Charity started as a fundraising project for Tri Kappa’s programs that they lead throughout the year. However, this project turned into much more. Allowing creative community members to showcase their talents using materials that otherwise would be undervalued and thrown away, this program brought a unified vision and intrigue for the arts and for recycling items for art sake. To see the artists’ faces when their chair was up on the auction block in a bidding war enriched the community’s camaraderie. The days leading up to the event were also encouraging as members in the community were telling their stories on where they found their old chairs. Some people would find a chair in a ditch, a second hand store, in their grandmother’s basement. Some organizations were needing to get rid of chairs and donated them to artists. There was a local synergy of “save the chairs.”

With over 74 chairs being recreated for a new purpose and not being thrown away, begins a new mindset for recycling within the Culver community. People are looking forward to the next event and searching for that piece of furniture to recreate. The support of over 20 local businesses and over ten media mentions in the local newspapers as well as over 2000 hits to the blog proved a successful publicity endeavor. Lastly, the group of about 30 women were able to raise over $10,000 for local charities. Saving 74 chairs from going into the landfill and providing scholarships, Christmas baskets, funds for the fire station, school, library and individual families in need are really what makes this world a better place.

“You can’t save the world. But, you can make a difference in your community, one chair, one person at a time,” comments Andrea Cook, Co-Chair of Chairs for Charity event. Culver Tri Kappa is expected to launch its second Chairs for Charity event in 2011 and it is expected that many more people will be involved.

Indy Green Fest and More

Andrea Cook, Indiana’s Green Entrepreneur of the Year Finalist, business owner and community enthusiast demonstrates a passion for eco-friendly activities spanning from her company's strong portfolio of green clients, her love of re-purposed creative furnishings, special mom-n-daughter time growing worm farms and her latest entrepreneurial endeavor that she hopes will paint the town green: Project Green Building.

Learn more about this green-venture at this weekend's Indy Green Fest. Event will kick off with the Indiana Green Awards Gala Dinner at the Hilton Gardens in Indianapolis on Thursday evening. Indy Green Fest will take place at the Indiana State Fair Grounds, March 26th - 28th. For more information on this green-filled event, visit http://greenfestindy.com.

Presenting, “A Girl and Her Green Dream”
Indy Green Fest, Seminar Room
11:30 a.m., Sunday, March 28th
A small town girl with a big vision called Project Green Building shares her dream of taking green mainstream. Join her in the journey as she shares her plan to purchase a distressed downtown property and renovate it into a green building for the sake of awareness. Hear more about the obstacles and her plan to spread the words "reduce, reuse and recycle" through living, working, building and learning in her community.

Mistakes Businesses Make Trying To Go Green

We've been borderline-obsessed with thinking how we can improve our dedication to eco-friendly working, living and learning.

Since being recognized as a finalist for the Indiana Green Business's Entrepreneur of the Year, we admittedly acknowledge that we are unqualified to represent such a noble title.

True confessions: at times we don't use both sides of our paper, we drive more than ride our bikes or walk, we will use plastic bags if and when we frequently forget our recyclable bags and we even shop at Wal-Mart.

Just yesterday "green" guests came to our offices and we politely offered drinks, as in coffee or water, and one of the gentelmen kindly declined and reminded us of the plastic bottle conundrum. Yes. Conundrum.

In the spirit of taking green initiatives mainstream, we would like to share an interesting article we throughly enjoyed. We hope you will find it interesting and thought-provoking as well.

"Five Mistakes Businesses Make Trying To Go Green," written by Jill Fehrenbacher CEO, founder, Inhabitat.com. Read article >>

Together, businesses can impact the green initiatives and take steps to save the earth. As for this little marketing shop in small town Indiana, we admit we have a far way to travel to reach the ideal image of an earth-saving business.

Plymouth Small Business Owner, Green Entrepreneur of the Year Finalist

The Midas Center owner, Andrea Cook has been selected as a finalist in the Indiana Green Business Awards for the Green Entrepreneur of the Year. It is an honor to be chosen as a finalist for this category as a small business owner in Plymouth who uses business savvy and skill to help build the brands that make our world a better place.

With a passion for eco-friendly living both in the home and at the office, her company's strong portfolio of green clients along with the office décor of repurposed creative furnishings shows she's moving in the right direction with her dedication to taking "green mainstream."

Join us in the next several posts as The Midas Center uncovers some unique actions that support this nomination including:
- why they recommend the hosting service that supports The Midas Center's web site,
- what makes the paint on her office walls so special,
- when she first realized that green endeavors were important to her and
- who has inspired her and encourages her to make the green decisions every day.

Also, read more about the green clients, including earthworks, Recycle Depot, Culver United Methodist Church's Thrift Store, Lake Maxinkuckee Environmental Council and Sorian. It is a priviledge to work with these clients and to collectively work towards building awareness for earth-friendly living and improve the use of our resources. Learn more about their services and the ways they are making a difference in our community too!