Business Success Stories
Our collection of success stories are designed to give you ideas on how to implement your own climate success story. Use the filters on the left to narrow down your search by location, industry type, or action type. Many of our success stories are also Small Business Award winners, your business could be next!
Capitola Veterinary Hospital is a full-service veterinary medical facility that has become an eco-friendly center for all pets and clients. They have taken a number of significant actions to reduce their carbon footprint over the years. For example, they have eliminated paper use by converting to paperless medical records, invested in a paperless fax machine, and retrofitted all of their old fluorescent tubes with high efficiency LED tubes and T8 tubes.
Built in the 1950s, but newly remodeled, the owners of Capitol Bowl have taken steps to attract more customers and lower their carbon footprint. Capitol Bowl’s activities include open bowling, organized leagues, birthday parties, and company celebrations. The restaurant in the facility prepares everything from scratch and is open for lunch and dinner. In the past three years, the owners have transformed an old, inefficient building into an energy-smart, water-conserving, beautiful bowling center and restaurant.
“Changing the world one revolution at a time,” is Aperia Technologies’ motto, which they aim to do with their Halo Tire Inflator. This technology addresses the problem of tire under-inflation, which has been known to increase carbon dioxide emissions, oil consumption, and tire waste. Aperia Technologies’ achievements in creating products that reduce carbon dioxide emissions translates into their commitment to incorporate eco-friendly office practices and green building features into their business operations.
Allterra Solar is an all-around proactive company that educates its employees and peers on environmental technology and sustainability. They are an outstanding solar company that evaluates the customer’s energy needs and provides quality reliable installation and service.
Lake Merritt Dental is a comprehensive, eco-friendly, top rated whole oral healthcare clinic. Their dentists perform a full gamut of dental services from preventive hygiene care to complex implant surgeries, while also working to conserve energy, reduce water, and manage waste. In evaluating their business operations, Lake Merritt Dental utilized PG&E’s online portal to monitor their energy practices and create goals to reduce usage levels.
Precision Labs Calibration in Palmdale, CA is a Native American owned business in Antelope Valley that performs high technology calibration services for medical, aerospace, agricultural, and film industries. They calibrate electrocardiography machines, attune sound and light meters, and perform highly accurate measurements of temperature and humidity.
E&B Auto Repair, located in Fort Bragg, is dedicated to providing customers with quality service and fair prices at their California Certified Green Station.
PaperCulture.com is an e-commerce business that cultivates sustainability within their business operations. The firm designs products such as holiday cards, invitations, announcements, stationery, wall art, and labels with the environment in mind. PaperCulture.com is committed to conserving natural resources in all aspects of their business. They use 100 percent post-consumer recycled paper and bamboo for wall art, plant a tree in a U.S. national forest with every order placed (the goal of their “Cards to Trees” program is to plant one million trees) and purchases carbon offsets.
Sacramento Event Planners (SEP) provides eco-friendly and zero-waste event planning services, eco-event audits, sustainable event management education and consultation.
The Bath Workshop creates custom, blended bath and body products that are all natural and safe for the environment. They strive towards becoming a more sustainable business by focusing on energy efficiency, waste reduction, recycling and teaching their employees the best ways to reduce their own carbon footprint. The Bath Workshop invites customers to bring back their “empty” containers and offers them a monetary incentive for recycling.
Monterey County Weekly Monterey County Weekly is an independent newsmedia company located in Seaside, California. At their core is their weekly newspaper, published every Thursday since 1988, plus three weekly e-newsletters to over 30,000 subscribers, a website (online since 1996) featuring daily news, arts and entertainment and mobile site.
Opened in December 2012, Ohana Pet Hospital is a full-service veterinary clinic that is committed to environmental sustainability and serves as a role model for small businesses. Ohana was presented with a CoolCalifornia Small Business Climate Leader award in 2013 for their achievements in reducing waste, recycling, and conserving energy and water.
Nortra-Cables, Inc. offers custom cable and wire harness design, prototyping and manufacturing services for medical, computer, communications, industrial and electromechanical applications, and is constantly striving to reduce its carbon footprint.
The Inn On First was the first northern California bed and breakfast inn to be certified “green” by the State of California. As a proud member of the California Green Lodging Association and the Bay Area Green Business Association, The Inn On First has implemented a number of sustainable actions including the installation of low-flow fixtures for showers, tankless water heaters, energy saving light bulbs and in-room climate control systems.
Located in the city of Chula Vista, El Primero Boutique B&B Hotel offers guests a unique experience at an environmentally-friendly hotel. The El Primero Hotel was built in 1930 and has since been updated with low-flow appliances, solar photovoltaic panels, fruit trees and much more.
As the first business to be certified “green” by the City of Thousand Oaks, Conejo Awards is considered a leader in green innovation. Conejo Awards, an awards and promotional materials retailer, remains committed to being environmentally responsible in all aspects of their business.
Codexis, Inc. is a bio-fuel, pharmaceutical and chemical engineering firm that is transforming their Redwood City headquarters in an effort to increase waste diversion and foster employee education and participation in environmentally friendly practices. Codexis headquarters hosts over 100 employees spread across three buildings filled with laboratories, office spaces and industrial facilities. In 2013, Codexis launched a waste centralization program to collect and sort trash.
Demonstrating their commitment to sustainability, Chavez Trucking, replaced old, heavy diesel trucks with new ones to reduce their carbon footprint and increase fuel efficiency.
Through the Sacramento Emergency Clean Air Transportation Program, a program that provided incentives for owners of heavy-duty vehicles to replace them with more efficient ones, Chavez Trucking replaced 16 old trucks with new ones, reducing greenhouse gas emissions and fuel use. These actions increase fuel efficiency by 1.5 miles per gallon, saving them over $80,000 per year!
Choice Lunch, a school lunch delivery service, is dedicated to providing school-age children with healthy, sustainable and delicious meals. Meals are ordered and paid for by parents and delivered to the child’s school just in time for lunch. Choice Lunch also seeks to educate parents and kids on healthy eating options and encourages a nutritionally balanced diet. Choice Lunch is committed to sustainable practices. All food containers and lunch bags are compostable to help reduce unnecessary trash sent to the landfill.
Quivira Vineyards and Winery, located in Sonoma County, believes they can make a positive impression on the land by using only organic and biodynamic farming practices. Biodynamic farming, simply put, is a “closed loop” agricultural philosophy created to maintain crop health without added chemicals or external additions. The core of biodynamics is creating the healthiest soil and environment possible for Quivira’s vineyards, compost, chicken coops and vegetable garden.