ecoLightbulb Blog

Starting to close down ecoLightbulbs

noreply@blogger.com (Wayne) — Sun, 22 Feb 2009 03:28:00 +0000

We started ecoLightbulbs two years ago to help fight global warming by encouraging people to adopt and use CFLs. In early 2007, CFLs were starting to come down in price, but were still quite expensive. They most sold in the $6-8/bulb range across online retailers as well as brick and mortar stores.

Over the past two years, the price of CFLs has dropped dramatically as major retailers such as Wal-Mart, Target, Home Depot, and others all started heavily promoting these type of light bulbs. The New York Times wrote a great article about how Wal-Mart was helping to drive CFL usage and set a goal of selling 100 million CFLs in 2008. In 2009, through the effort of these companies the prices of CFLs has reached a point where they are comparable to ecoLightbulbs.

Today, 2/21/2009, the price for a 6 pack of 23W CFL from Walmart.com is $19.32 or $3.22/bulb. At ecoLightbulbs our price is $3.09, which is marked up 25% from the $2.49 we buy the bulbs from our manufacturer. The markup is mostly there to cover shipping costs as overall we break even. The difference of 13 cents is not enough to justify continuing to run ecoLightbulbs. Big retailers sell hundreds of millions of CFLs a year, so they probably buy the bulbs at a fraction of our cost. So they can sell at ~$3.00 per bulb and make a profit. On the other hand, at ecoLightbulbs, we've put together a scrappy team of volunteers to run our business and our cost structure barely allows us to break even at ~$3.00 per bulb. This just shows the power of big business when it puts its mind to solving a problem.

I'd like to think it was our effort that forced Wal-Mart and others to lower their prices to compete, but that's probably not the case. =) Our job at ecoLightbulb of providing CFLs affordably has been addressed by bigger retailers though, so we can start shutting down ecoLightbulbs to move to other endeavors.

I'm very proud of the achievements ecoLightbulbs was able to make over the past two years. We've sold 12,255 CFLs and over their lifetime these bulbs will remove 8MM lbs of CO2 from the atmosphere and save $750,000 in electricity bills.

We will continue to run the site until our remaining inventory is sold. I've lowered prices on our remaining bulbs, selling them at a loss, to help them sell faster.

Finally, I'd like to extend a sincere thanks to everyone who purchased bulbs from us, as well as friends and family that supported our efforts.

--Wayne

2,500 Bulbs Sold!

noreply@blogger.com (Wayne) — Thu, 05 Jul 2007 07:11:00 +0000

Happy July 4th everyone!

We hit a great milestone today in our effort to sell 10,000 bulbs. As of today we broke the 2,500 bulb barrier and reached 2,529 bulbs sold!

These bulbs represent:
$22,172/yr saved in electric bills
224,074 lbs/yr CO2 saved = 19.4 cars removed from roads = 30.6 acres of forest planted

In the coming months we'll continue to ramp up our efforts by creating more partnerships with other websites and stocking a greater variety of bulbs. We sold ~2,500 bulbs in the first half of the year, let's see if we can beat that in the remaining half.

NYC Proposes Energy Efficient Taxi Fleet

noreply@blogger.com (Wayne) — Tue, 22 May 2007 22:48:00 +0000

Reading news like this makes me happy. All of NYC's cabs will be converted to hybrid vehicles by 2012.

New York Times
May 22, 2007

Bloomberg Proposes Energy Efficient Taxi Fleet

By ANAHAD O’CONNOR and RAY RIVERA

Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg announced today a plan to replace the city’s entire yellow cab fleet with environmentally friendly hybrid vehicles over the next five years.

The proposal is the latest push in Mayor Bloomberg’s PlaNYC to create a more environmentally sustainable city and to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 30 percent by 2030. The new taxi standards would be phased in over a four-year period and would lead to a full fleet of hybrids by 2012.

“There’s an awful lot of taxicabs on the streets of New York City obviously, so it makes a real big difference,” Mayor Bloomberg said this morning on the NBC News program “Today.” “These cars just sit there in traffic sometimes, belching fumes; this does a lot less. It’s a lot better for all of us.”

Full Article

The current Crown Victoria taxis get 10-15mpg and the new standards will require taxis get at least 30mpg. I did some quick calculations to see how much oil this will save and how much CO2 this will save from the atmosphere.

Gallons of gasoline saved: 87.3MM/year!
CO2 reduction: 873,313 tons/year!!!

My calculations (if you care to see the assumptions I used)

It's amazing what public policy can do to address environmental issues.

We've been selling lightbulbs for a while now and as of today are removing ~80 tons of CO2/year. We'd have to sell 18MM lightbulbs to equal the effects of NYC phasing out their cabs! Well, every little bit helps I suppose... onwards selling lightbulbs.

1500 Bulbs sold!

noreply@blogger.com (Wayne) — Tue, 15 May 2007 17:06:00 +0000

It's been a while since I've last posted and things here at ecoLightbulbs are going well. Here are some highlights since March:

4/10/2007 - 1,000 bulbs sold! Thanks to a customer in New Mexico.

4/26/2007 - Attend the Google Environmental fair. This was a great event for us as we got a lot of encouragement and support from our coworkers at Google. The fair featured over 30 booths with organizations ranging from PG&E (who was giving away free light bulbs, which made it a bit difficult for us to sell them) to ecoFabulous (a blog that features sexy sustainable stuff, to make being eco friendly a fashionable and trendy thing to do).

5/15/2007 - 1,500 bulbs sold! Thanks to a big order of 150 bulbs from Arizona.

What does 1,500 CFLs replacing incandescent bulbs mean? Well look below.

Onwards to our goal of 10,000 bulbs sold this year!

Behind the scenes at ecoLightbulbs

noreply@blogger.com (Vivian) — Mon, 19 Mar 2007 07:12:00 +0000

Every weekend, we gather our light bulb orders from the week and we set forth in a packaging and shipping frenzy. We thought we'd let you take a peek at what it's really like behind the scenes...

First, we count out all of the orders...

And then we pack up each order with care, and packing peanuts...lots of 'em!

Here's Wayne overwhelmed from the excitement...we had a record week!

And here are the final packages all ready for this weekend's trip to the post office!

We hope you'll keep supporting us in our goal to save the environment by switching to CFL's today!

Support Al Gore and his global warming fight

noreply@blogger.com (Wayne) — Fri, 16 Mar 2007 23:30:00 +0000

Al Gore is testifying before Congress on March 21st about the climate crisis. Help him out. He's gathering 350,000 signatures to bring with him into the committee room to show the public's support.

Visit http://algore.com/cards.html if you want to help out. Below is his letter asking for support.

Dear Friend,

On March 21st, I will testify before Congress on the immediate action that needs to be taken to end the climate crisis. At the hearing, I will deliver the 294,374 messages you signed, demonstrating that hundreds of thousands of people share my sense of urgency.

If an additional 55,626 people sign our message, it will be as though 350,000 of us are there at the hearing expressing our determination to convince Congress to act. Having served in the House and Senate, I can tell you that members of these committees would find this to be a meaningful and impressive show of support.

There are only 5 days left before the hearings begin, so please do not pass up this opportunity to join in showing the broad public support we need in order to solve the climate crisis. I know you have friends or family who care deeply about this issue but have yet to sign our message to Congress.

The reason Congress has so far failed to act is not because there are no solutions to the problem. Nor is it because the majority doesn't believe that the climate crisis is real. They have failed to act, because they have not yet faced a sufficient expression of political will on the part of the American people demanding they confront our climate crisis head on. You and I know that political will is a renewable resource, and enough already exists to start solving this crisis. We just have to communicate that forcefully to the political leaders of our country.

In the last two weeks alone 101,673 people visited AlGore.com and signed our message to Congress. This is an incredible demonstration of the energy behind this issue.

In my testimony, of course, I will speak about the scientific evidence for global warming - just reiterated six weeks ago by the world's scientists in the latest report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. But frankly, the debate on the science has long been over - except for a diminishing number of skeptics and deniers.

At this point, it is far more important to deliver your message about the urgency with which this crisis must be faced. Political leaders need to know that you intend to reward those who do the right thing and that you will work to replace those who do not.

Together we are building a movement that has the potential to translate your strong feelings into effective change for our country. And we all know that when the United States changes - and offers leadership - the entire world will follow.

Thank you,
Al Gore

Lots of "firsts" today for ecoLightbulbs!

noreply@blogger.com (Wayne) — Wed, 28 Feb 2007 18:14:00 +0000

Today was a very big day for us here at ecoLightbulbs. We've been in operation for roughly 40 days and we've come a long way. Here are some of the major things that happened to us today, Feb 28, 2007...

We sold our 500th bulb! This has greatly exceeded our expectations, as our initial site was setup as an experiment to see if online distribution of lightbulbs would work. We've heard a resounding YES! to this, so are now moving forward with the next phase of our growth. In the coming days you will see a revamped website and more products.

In addition, we were mentioned in the Asheville Citizen Times by columnist Dave Russell. This is the first time we've been mentioned in a news publication, and it's really helped us drive sales of our bulbs. Here a short snippet of his column.

Yes, each of us can play at least a small role in reducing energy consumption, pollution

Dave Russell

Asheville Citizens Times
February 28, 2007 12:15 am

All this recent talk about saving energy at home by installing compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFLs) reminds me of the time we had our oil tank filled when we lived on the coast of Connecticut. We called for a delivery when the first hint of cold weather blew inland from Long Island Sound, as we’d never lived in a place as cold as Connecticut. Nor had we ever burned oil to stay warm, so I had quite a few questions for the local man who backed the small tanker truck into the driveway.
...
CFLs are a good investment now that they have improved. The DOE says CFLs use at “least two-thirds less energy than standard incandescent bulbs to provide the same amount of light and last up to 10 times longer.” Over those 10 years, homeowners will save $30 or more in energy costs. Sure, they cost more — about $7 a bulb at our local big-box home improvement store.
Interested parties can buy two dozen 100-watt equivalent CFL bulbs for $25 from www.ecolightbulbs.org.

Here's a full link to the column: link Dave - thanks for the mention to ecoLightbulbs!

Finally, I noticed today that we're finally in the search results on Google. So go Google "ecolightbulbs" and you'll be able to find us! Haven't showed up on Yahoo or MSN yet, but hopefully that will happen soon.

Australia bans traditional light bulbs

noreply@blogger.com (Vivian) — Tue, 20 Feb 2007 19:55:00 +0000

Today, Australia announced that it was phasing out the use of traditional light bulbs in favour of energy efficient fluorescent ones. Traditional incandescent light bulbs will be banned Down Under by 2010. Bravo! Hopefully, Australia will be the first of many developed nations to start enforcing such policies. See the NYT article and the official announcement from the Australian government (in PDF format).

noreply@blogger.com (Wayne) — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 00:07:00 +0000

Discussions and comments about Wal-Mart becoming more eco-friendly. They've committed to selling 100MM CFLs in 2007.

Terrapass: The evolution of Wal-Mart’s CFL program
by Adam
Published: January 2, 2007
The Times took a deeper look recently at Wal-Mart’s lightbulb push, providing a fascinating glimpse of just what it means when the world’s largest retailer applies its heft to an environmental issue.
Article

NY Times Business: Wal-Mart Puts Some Muscle Behind Power-Sipping Bulbs
By Michael Barbaro
Published: January 2, 2007
The retailer is determined to push energy-saving light bulbs with the help of some unlikely partners.
Article

Some interesting videos...

noreply@blogger.com (Wayne) — Thu, 01 Feb 2007 23:36:00 +0000

Edison Project

Edison Project is a program that promotes resourceful energy saving tactics through the use of CFL light bulbs. Graceland SIFE is spreading the word about this project in hope that other SIFE teams will join to collaboratively change the world, one light bulb at a time.

Incandescent Vs. Compact Fluorescent Light Bulbs

Frank DiMassa always says "you can't change people, but you CAN change their light bulbs!"
In this little video clip T.H. Culhane describes the differences between Incandescent and CFL bulbs.

Why I started ecoLightbulbs

noreply@blogger.com (Wayne) — Tue, 23 Jan 2007 12:31:00 +0000

Ever since I was a child I've been interested in environmentally friendly practices. When I was about 10 years old I received a book who's name eludes me now, but basically the book had 100 things you could do to save the earth. I remember going around my house putting milk jugs in the toilet to reduce the amount of water used in flushes, taking food scraps and building a composting pile in our back yard, and many other things.

Now, years later, as an adult I continue to be passionate about the environment and living in a way that preserves our environment as much as possible. In recent years more and more news has come out about the dangers of global warming and how never ending increases in consumption by humans is destroying the world at an unprecedented pace. After thinking for this for a while I decided that I should stop sitting around waiting for others to fix the problems that we've all created, and that I should try... to the best of my ability to help preserve our planet.

So what am I going to do:

Global warming comes down to the creation of greenhouse gases. There are two ways to reduce this impact. Make energy more efficiently (i.e., solar panels, windpower, cleaner burning fuels, etc..) or use less energy. I am focusing on the latter and working on ways to reduce overall energy consumption, specifically by promoting the adoption and use of compact fluorescent light bulbs.

The plan is to acquire the bulbs as cheaply as possible and distribute them at as low of a cost as possible to as many people as possible. To achieve this we are going to pursue the following areas:

Find the best balance of high quality bulbs at the lowest cost.
Sell directly to consumers at no profit to ecoLightbulbs - by removing middlemen retails from the equation we believe we can provide the bulbs to consumers at much lower cost than current exists in the market
Find co-marketing arrangements where people reading materials about compact fluorescents can then directly move to purchase the bulbs, instead of waiting to find them at a store

Through the combination of these approaches, we hope to sell many many bulbs. Increasing usage and adoption of the bulbs will hopefully spur the market to increase production of these light bulbs, driving down costs. Eventually our hope is that adoption and use of these bulbs is so widespread that our organization is no longer needed.

As for my day job, I work at Google in Mountain View, CA as a product manager building advertising products. I thought that I'd try to leverage some of the things I've learned during my time at Google to build a not-for-profit business that could help change the landscape of how people light their homes.

If you have any questions or comments about what we're doing feel free to email me anytime at wayne@ecolightbulbs.org. I'd love to hear from you!