It's Easier To Be Green

Jennifer Shine, president of eMazzanti Technologies, Hoboken, N.J., already has. Growing public awareness around environmental issues is ready fuel for her sales and marketing pitches for things such as managed services, thin-client computing solutions and energy-efficient firewalls, Shine said. When she saw the Al Gore documentary "An Inconvenient Truth," an (energy-efficient) light bulb went on in her head. Now, she intends to use concerns over global warming and other environmental issues to justify a rebranding of her company. "I'm actually writing a pamphlet for all my customers about how they can use technology to better their relationship with the environment," Shine said.

Slide Show: Tackling E-Waste

The good news is that she's about to have a whole lot of source material. In the coming weeks and months, companies across the high-tech channel -- including some of the industry's "green giants" (see story) -- will be talking up energy efficiency, recycling, refurbishment and other environmental initiatives as they ride a wave of high-profile publicity and get ahead of what could become a dizzying number of new state laws regulating aging technology. Solution providers, in turn, can use these activities to write their own scripts for green dialogues that could translate into that other green stuff—money.

This week, Ingram Micro, in partnership with asset disposition giant Intechra, will crank up its existing recycling services through the Ingram Micro Outlet. Under the new Ingram Micro service, VARs can hand over qualified used ink and laser printer cartridges, fax cartridges and cellular phones, receiving cash credits that they can apply either to the price of new products or use to help get their customers a price break. The old products are refreshed, refurbished and remarketed as appropriate. Meanwhile, solution providers can be assured that the items have been disposed of and handled legally and ethically.

IBM, meanwhile, is launching a pilot program with a leading global supply chain company to educate resellers on green issues and how to apply them to their sales pitches. This follows its move to establish a 3 percent referral fee for business partners sending equipment to its technology asset recovery facilities. Samsung Electronics America, among other peripheral companies, will launch free toner recycling this quarter.

"Time makes a believer out of you," said Clark Aikers, vice chairman of Nashville, Tenn.-based Intechra, which has six processing plants around the United States. "We are seeing more and more companies wake up every day that don't want to take the risk associated with dumping tech equipment."

Those risks range from state legislation that has banned computers and other tech equipment from landfills to privacy laws dictating how data needs to be properly expunged before a system is redeployed or destroyed. "There is a balance between how you get your client a return on investment as well as keep them compliant," said Paul Baum, CEO of PlanITROI, Denville, N.J., which works with Panasonic Computer Solutions Co. as its "End of Life" partner for products including Panasonic's Toughbooks.

Peter Sierra, CEO of White Palms Technology, an asset disposition company in Hohokus, N.J., said he thinks the IT community should make it more publicly known that the small and midsize VAR can offer services like his to customers. He's doing his part by actively recruiting resellers. "I find that I am getting a lot of reception to this from VARs that are not necessarily politically correct or the environmental type," he said.

For Pete Busam, CEO of Decisive Business Systems, Pennsauken, N.J., proper disposal is part of every deal, a service for which he pays a local partner an average of $7 to $8 per unit (or about $4 for a stand-alone hard drive). Current programs offered by his large vendor partners, Busam said, are too expensive for him to use.

Dan Lupardus, sales manager at Futureware, a VAR and custom-system builder in Omaha, Neb., uses the Ingram Micro Outlet and discusses environmentally aware disposal and life-cycle management with all of his customers, although he almost always has to introduce the topic. "They know it's wrong to throw it away, they just don't have an avenue to do it [properly]," he said. "Recycling is a great way to get your foot in the door."