This afternoon I thought I’d check out the new organic & environmentally conscious store As Nature Intended which opened near my apartment complex a few weeks ago. I went in there with the intention of completing my first ever fully organic and environmentally conscious grocery shop! You see, one of my new years resolutions was to improve the way I treat the environment. One way that we can help the environment is by being a smarter consumer – by ensuring that the choices we make in the store are environmentally conscious.
I have always tried to be a smarter consumer through mainstream shopping channels. It’s really quite simple, just look for locally made products contained in recyclable packaging, fresh fruit and vegetables from local sources, and avoid all manner of junk food! Also while you’re shopping, minimise the purchase of beef related products, and check out the environmental credentials of the products you’re buying if they’re visible on the packaging.
I thought by shopping at As Nature Intended I could up the ante somewhat, and further minimise the impact of my retail actions upon the environment. Unfortunately, what I found is it costs considerably more to be proactively green in this area. Sure, there’s things you can do when shopping that don’t need to cost you any more, but shopping at a specialist niche store really doesn’t appear to be the way to go. I only purchased 10 small items which I was running low on, but found that doing this quite quickly ate away at my food budget. Just how expensive was it? Well, here’s my experience.
The data below shows a comparison of the cost of purchasing organic and/or environmentally friendly products, when compared to equivalent products that I could have purchased at my local woolworths. Ten products were purchased, and below is the comparison of the cost per item of the product from As Nature Intended (displayed in blue), when compared to Woolworths Homeshop online* (displayed in green).
As you can see, the overall total shopping at As Nature Intended is substantially higher than Woolworths. This is just something I can’t afford at the moment, and is going to be a real blocker in shopping at this store in the future.
The following table provides a per-item comparison, just incase anyone wants to dispute my figures, or see what was purchased.
Unfortunately in this case, my conclusion is that shopping here is just not economically viable for me at this time. I am struggling a little financially (as anyone who reads my personal blog will know), and I just can’t afford a 38% increase in my shopping budget. This doesn’t mean I’m going to give up in trying to be more environmentally conscious, but unfortunately it does mean that I’m not going to be able to be as proactive in this space as I’d like to be.
Do you want some tips on how to help the environment every day? Check out the tips on the following website: https://climatefriendly.com/personal. And please, feel free to comment with your hints and tips on what we can do to help the environment.
* = Woolworths Homeshop prices taken from www.homeshop.com.au as at 12/06/2007, using price for the Canberra area. Delivery costs associated with homeshop were not used in these calculations.
The source document for the above can be found here. Requires Numbers, part of the iWork 08 suite.
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