Notice to all gadget makers and vendors: if you
reduce your packaging and engage in
environmentally conscious behavior, you'll get free press out of it and
positive brand awareness to boot. Take for example AT&T's newly announced design specifications for its own-brand phone accessories and packaging requirements for cellphone makers. Both are geared toward minimizing the surplus of paper and plastic that tends to come with the purchase of your device, and both will require the use of recycled and
recyclable materials. AT&T expects to save 200 tons of excess materials by the end of 2010, which is very encouraging, but also disturbing in that it lets us know we were wasting 200 tons each year that could, presumably, have been saved by some sager planning. Anyway, better late than never -- and guess what, it will probably end up costing the company less than those
inane advert attacks on Verizon.
posted March 5th 2010 5:41AM
How about giving customers a small discount for opting in for online only billing?
@pika2000
Please don't say anything about online only billing. They'll start charging a "'convenience' fee" instead.
@pika2000
Exactly, the saving eventually won't apply to "we the people". Good for saving trees and make company even more money and nothing else. I hope they use those money they save to hire more customer support and not just pocketed themselves.
@pika2000 - YES, YES, YES!
@pika2000 what about fixing the damn network instead of green marketing propaganda?
sager?
Shame they don't save their customers some paper, the green kind.
AT&T Wireless might be on the green wagon, but how can the rest of the company be environmentally friendly when they have a bunch of E-Waste in the name of U-Verse set top boxes?
Those things are complete trash.
Palm's packaging went eco with the Treo Pro. No manual or CD. You download it instead. Rubber bands instead of tie-wires No plastic baggies to separate things. Instead there is this clever corrugated cardboard snaking it's way through the box. There is some plastic to hold the device, but that'sit. It looks pretty cool, actually.
@ColonelKernel
An applicable question: does having instructions, etc. on the internet only, instead of in printed form, actually mean less waste? In order to read the manual, a person has to have their computer and monitor running, connected to the internet and a powered server farm, and spend that time reading what they need to find scrolling through a PDF. That all uses energy. As long as that device is being supported, say for around five years, that infrastructure needs to remain in place.
Printing a small manual is a one time cost of energy and resources instead of a renewing resource, and potentially saves user time because they can flip straight through the manual quickly and find what they need, no lengthy scrolling or guessing applicable keywords.
I am not sure which is more eco-friendly ... I fear it may not be as clear cut as we would hope. From a user perspective, I'd rather have the small paper manual to help get over the learning curve, even if it directs me to a webpage to solve an obscure problem I'm unique enough to have; but that's just my personal preference.
@James Sonne If a product is well-designed and also has on-device help, most people should be happy with some sort of quick-start guide.
I guess, including manuals only starts becoming really wasteful when the manufacturer includes manuals in multiple languages (here in Europe you'll often find as many as ten manuals with devices).
*note that Apple does not specifically fall under these new packing requirements. Steve Jobs owns us.
@MRCUR
Job patent the word "Steve"... Opps I've said it, he gonna sue the pants off of me.
Does this mean they're going to quit sending me a fat envelope trying to sell me home phone service every 3 weeks?
at&t could be setting up baby hospitals and people would still bitch about them
Let's not pretend that good environmental practices matter to consumers.
During the years of Apple's meteoric rise they were rated the worst environmental offender in the CE industry, every time, and it didn't affect their sales or their image at all.
The few who actually heard about this, and wanted to like Apple anyway, just bought into Apple's "shoot the messenger" campaign (the messenger was Greenpeace).
So, perhaps some opportunistic announcements about green products produces free publicity, but good environmental policy will just cost a company money and doesn't help at all.
I agree with tm115. Look green is good, I get it and not everyone really cares I get that too. Complaining about every thing a company does just seems foolish to me. Look, here's a reality check for you. Google the name of any of the phone companies and type the word complaint after it. Every company including the big V returns over a million hits. At least my iPhone works is what I say and I am thankful for that. Green is good.
Nice one. Now time to move into the BIG BUCKS (AND ECHO FRIENDLY) SAVING$$$$. Time to put vertical axis wind turbines on those thousands of cell sites.
http://www.helixwind.com/
Can you imagine the hundreds of Millions of dollars in saving with nominal up front investment? Matter of fact these cell site add-ons will probably produce more energy than the cell site needs to operate. The extra power could be fed back into the grid or help supplement power for communities. Oh, and if you were nice you could lower our bills since a substantial operating cost (powering cell sites) would be darn near "0"!!
They should also trim down the packaging inside the devices, as in stop bloating the phones with crappy trialware we don't want!!!
How about moving toward better service. Who gives a crap about the packaging when the device that is packaged barely works?
Ummm...
RING RING
Hello is this AT&T? It is? Great... I just wanted to let you know that Sprint has already started doing this and decided to take it one step further by requiring all new phones also be made of a more green technology, cut their waste products and off-set their energy usage by implementing solar panels at their HQ. . So...ummmm... Dont be upset when no one cares. Talk to you soon bye now.
CLICK
@Roger A
And if people cared about what their phones were made of or packaged in it may mean something for Sprint, but their dwindling subscriber base is proof people care more about service than eco crap.
@Mr Pips
And if people cared about actual service, then they would select Sprint or Verizon over AT&T - the difference between "service" at Sprint and AT&T is that while Im on Sprint I have service. I cant say the same for my friends on AT&T.
I don't get it...so AT&T is going green...from charging all of their loyal customers stupid charges for our phone services. I just got my mom a LG xenon and they're charging me for a freaking texting plan that she doesn't need because AT&T doesn't have a decent phone that doesn't require a plan. Stupid...
Yes, cuz lack of eco-friendly packaging is where my beef lies with AT&T, not their crap service. While 200 tons may sound like a lot, in the grand scheme of things, it's a drop in the bucket. While every little bit helps, they don't deserve any press for this mostly empty gesture.