September 6, 2007 | Read Time: 1 minute
A prominent environmentalist is making waves by working for Wal-Mart on sustainability issues, says Fast Company magazine (September). Adam Werbach “has made a leap that is either visionary or naïve, depending on your perspective,” says the magazine.
Mr. Werbach, former president of the Sierra Club, became disillusioned with the ability of environmental groups to carry out their ideas, says the article: “What was needed, he said, was a new way of connecting sustainability to the aspirations of everyday people.” He found an opportunity to do just that, he tells the magazine, by becoming a consultant to Wal-Mart, whose chief executive has espoused a commitment to using renewable energy and to produce no waste.
Mr. Werbach designed a program for the company, the Personal Sustainability Project, aimed at changing habits and increasing awareness among Wal-Mart and Sam’s Clubs’ 1.3 million employees. Two volunteers from each store attend a paid daylong retreat to figure out how to make sustainability part of their daily lives.
Mr. Werbach has been vilified by some former colleagues and friends for his association with the company. But he sees his work there as having a bigger impact on the environmental movement than he could have as an outside activist. “Wal-Mart speaks to 90 percent of the American public,” he says.
The article is available online.
