Waste Not Want Not
Learn How Going Green Can Save You Green
BY ANDREA STRAND
On May 1, Interscapes Inc. President Ron Lyrek took a deep breath and canceled his company’s trash pickup service. The phone call was short, even somewhat sweet (the waste management representative congratulated him on his decision), but what it started was much, much larger.
In 2007—20 years after Interscapes Inc.’s inaugural year—Lyrek went to a woodworking trade show in Las Vegas. There he learned that helping the environment could help his company turn higher net profits by saving on the cost of things like energy, fuel and trash pickup. But four children and an already successful business without going green didn’t allow much time for a companywide renovation. Plus, he wasn’t keen on green as a lifestyle. “It can become a religion to people,” he says of the green movement.
Lately, though, things have been changing. Over the past few months, the environment is on everyone’s radar, from news reporters to Interscapes Inc.’s clients, who were requesting products made from environmentally sustainable materials. It was now crucial that Lyrek consider the opportunities that lie in green technology, and after 20 years, this meant all or nothing, and it would start with taking out the trash.
Interscapes Inc. manufactures architectural woodwork across much of the Metro area. Serving around 500 clients every year, its résumé includes the mock-up of the new Minnesota Twins suite located in City Center, the streamlined cabinets and pharmacy area at Hennepin County Medical Center—Lyrek used to be the in-house cabinetmaker for Metropolitan Medical Center—the seating area at D. Brian’s Deli and Catering in the Campbell Mithun skyway, and the beautiful yet functional cabinets and shelving for the Heritage Christian Academy in Maple Grove. In everything it makes, Interscapes Inc. offers the option of Leadership in
Energy and Environmental Design (LEED)- certified green products or products made out of materials that are environmentally sustainable and nonpolluting. Now it is transforming the way its facility works to reflect its products, taking the profitable lean concept to the next level: green. For Lyrek, green isn’t about an altruistic commitment to save the earth. It is a business decision that centers on efficiency, his staff, good stewardship of the resources he’s entrusted with and, most of all, profit.
Transforming Business
Dwarfed by his expansive wood desk and cabinets, which soar nearly to the ceiling, the fast-talking, polo-wearing, buzz-cut-sporting Lyrek doesn’t look the part of a stereotypical environmental hippie. A self-proclaimed political conservative, Lyrek maintains a business ideology prioritizing people (his workers) over profits, and profits over planet.
There is no question that Lyrek’s commitment to his workers helped persuade him to make the green transition. Before implementing green, a discreet yet steady stream of environment related articles had been appearing on Lyrek’s desk. One of the men behind these “gifts” was director of project management Peter Fredrickson. An environmentalist whose daily commute consists of a lengthy bike ride, it’s safe to say that Fredrickson embraces the lifestyle that Lyrek was initially reluctant to embrace. Fredrickson and his wife stopped using chemicals and non-biodegradable cleaners years ago as a way to do their part to help the earth. They are now teaching their children to make the same earth-friendly decisions. “[A few other employees and I] have been encouraging Ron about this for a while,” Fredrickson says with a smile. Before the switch, he and a few other employees would collect aluminum and plastic cans under their desks at work to recycle at home. He is therefore happy with Lyrek’s decision to fully embrace the green movement. “If you baby-step it, you’re not going to be forced to create an instant changeover,” he says of the switch from trash to recycling.
“Instant,” however, might not be quite the right adjective for such a daunting transformation. Walking onto the concrete production floor, production manager Tom Chartier has to raise his voice over the coarse sounds of edgebanders, C-N-C routers and the brand-new wood grinder. “It’s not easy going green,” he shouts over the din. “We’re still reorganizing.” After rearranging its space with help from Enterprise Minnesota, Interscapes is down to 13,000 (from 15,000) square feet, which takes less energy. But production is running at an all-time high, at $346 per square foot in sales.
In fact, Interscapes Inc.’s sales rival companies that have more than double the space. Dust from the wood grinder coats sections of the floor. Evidence of lean training with Enterprise Minnesota abounds in the form of bright orange signs proclaiming, “ELIMINATE WA STE” and “CONTINUOUS FLOW.”
Recycling containers also dot the facility, specifying aluminum, plastic, paper, steel or compost as their intended contents. Intended, because recycling is not as simple as it may seem. Plastics are especially challenging because there are different varieties, identified by the numbers in the center of the recycling symbol stamped on each one. While most recycling facilities accept plastics labeled 1 and 2, types 6 and 7 are especially hard to recycle properly. “We’re still learning about what can be recycled,” Lyrek says. Chartier agrees. “It’s just an ongoing learning curve,” he says, “because we’re still learning what we have to separate and what we don’t have to separate, what [the recycling company] will take and what [it] won’t.” Recycling containers have also been added to the break rooms along with compost bins for lunch leftovers to keep trash costs at the bare minimum.
Despite the confusion of properly disposing plastics, aluminum and food, tangible benefits of Interscapes Inc.’s nod to Mother Earth are already evident. After nixing its trash pickup service, which had skyrocketed from $600 to $1,625 per month after waste management weighed the amount of trash being hauled away from the company, the five floor dumpsters that used to hog nearly 30 square yards in the facility and were emptied three times a week have disappeared, replaced by one 90-gallon trash can emptied once a week. The hours that workers used to spend hauling trash from the floor to the garbage trucks are now spent on production, and everyone agrees that the whole place smells better, especially since the garbage trucks used to collect fish factory waste from a plant down the road before collecting Interscapes Inc.’s trash. After one month, Interscapes Inc. does have some non-recyclable trash, but it is all in the one 90-gallon trash container, and its removal costs of $30 per month, only about 3 percent of the original $631 monthly bill. The $14 a month Interscapes Inc. gets from recycling its aluminum nearly offsets that cost.
Taking the LEED
Interscapes Inc.’s commitment to the green movement extends far beyond recycling. “Anyone can print off a one-page ‘certificate’ from the
Internet that says, ‘Hey, I’m green,’ ” Lyrek says. “What we’re trying to do is go the extra mile.” To avoid any notion of superficiality in its green practices—known as “greenwashing”— Interscapes Inc. is taking measures to prove its plan is the real deal. Lyrek is working toward a LEED certification, currently one of the most respected and official ways to be green. To that end, Interscapes Inc. is eliminating Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs)—organic chemical gases that are released into the air and can cause everything from itchy eyes to some types of cancer—from its materials and cleaning supplies. Rags are laundered to reduce the use of paper products. Company products and materials are only shipped in trucks that are full to conserve fuel costs. It even reuses wood shavings as animal bedding, a practice that might see a profit in the coming year.
Early next year, the company will embark on its greenest journey yet: moving to another building, which it’s looking at converting to be LEED certified. Moving into an existing facility is one of the greenest things to do because it avoids the vast amounts of waste and pollution generated from new construction and from tearing down existing buildings. The new building, constructed in 1969, will undergo a complete makeover to become the new green home of Interscapes Inc.
Because LEED is based on a point system, with one or more points awarded for each “green” improvement made, Lyrek says that the program is pushing him to make even more progressive changes than he might have on his own. “Even transportation is a part of the points that are available,” Lyrek says, before mentioning that the new location is on a bus line and a bike trail. “It has made me look at green in a new way.” Bike racks and a shower room will make biking to work more comfortable and convenient. Variable frequency drives on all electronic equipment will cut energy costs, as will an Ecogate System on the dust collection system that will slow RPMs when the system is not being used.
For some, the knowledge that work isn’t hurting the environment is a plus in itself. As Fredrickson says of being green, “That’s part of the way [my family] lives, and it’s just a bonus that my work can be the same way.” For Lyrek, the bonus is in better employee morale. “As we eliminate chemicals and we recycle, it really does help change the core values of the company and also increases the bond or the excitement in the company of what’s going on,” he says. “I can tell you, there’s been nothing but excitement.”
Setting a Green Standard Although
Lyrek’s priorities used to be “people, then profit, then planet,” he now says that the planet might be second in the ranking, due to its positive effect on profits. Interscapes Inc.’s green-certified desks and cabinets, among other things, are becoming highly coveted by companies as high gas prices and pollution continue to make green a bigger trend. Lyrek also points to an increase in companies that have a “green mission statement” detailing their commitment to good stewardship of the environment. Many business trends sparkle and then fade over time, but Lyrek says green is a trend that is here to stay. Fredrickson agrees, asserting that being green will be essential for companies that want to stay cutting-edge. “I think [green is] the way business in America is going,” Fredrickson says. “For any company that wants to be better, it’s best to not let this pass you by. Even just a year ago, it was kind of buzzing. But now, it just seems like it’s exploded.”
Sometimes customers have to spend more green to go green. Interscapes Inc. always shows customers the price difference in products made from green versus traditional building materials. While many green building materials fall in the same price range as their traditional counterparts, some are more expensive. Alternatives for adhesives, caulk and finishes typically raise the cost of a product because of the chemicals involved in making naturally derived yet equally dependable substitutes. On average, the company’s green products cost about 5 percent more to manufacture than traditional versions of the same cabinets or desks. While returning clients expect and gladly accept the price difference, others are sometimes disinclined to purchase the green materials. “It’s been a mixed bag,” Lyrek says of customers’ reactions to the higher cost of green products. “Some people have said yes, and some people have said no.”
But a person can only control his own actions. For Lyrek, money-saving applications of the green movement have extended to his life at home. “There have been some life changes,” he says. Lyrek has replaced his traditional light bulbs with fluorescent alternatives and encourages his wife and four children to save water while brushing their teeth. He is also recycling at home for the first time to reduce his trash costs. “It’s not normal for someone like me to do this,” Lyrek says of his newfound environmental savvy. “But I think there are two ways to look at it. You can either look at it as saving the earth. There is that. But you can also look at it on the flip side if you’re not bent that way. You can look at it as, it’s good for yourself, it’s good for your employees, it’s good for your family, it’s good for your customers and you’re conserving energy. It is common sense from that perspective, and it can be profitable.”
Cutting-edge companies are often the ones that feel they have the most to do, and Interscapes Inc. is no exception. A longtime Enterprise Minnesota client, Interscapes Inc. recently completed lean office training and hopes to continue its lean education by participating in Enterprise Minnesota’s Training Within Industry later this year. Green-wise, Lyrek says his company is still searching for the standard. “We’re trying to tie [green] into every decision that we make, from company vehicles to how we set up our workstations as we’re moving, to having a container at everybody’s workstations so they can recycle,” Lyrek says. “The biggest thing has been our commitment as a company. Making the decision in all that we do, to look out for the best environmental impact for ourselves and our customer.” Though LEED is highly respected, there is no one set of benchmark requirements for companies looking to go green. In addition to LEED, Interscapes Inc. is also pursuing Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certification, another third-party verification of the sustainability of its wood building materials. “A big thing with green is, what is green?” Lyrek says. “We’ve really been trying to figure out, what is green? What is the standard?” For Minnesota manufacturing companies, Interscapes Inc. might just be it.