* What: Eco-friendly soap and beauty products that are made with natural ingredients and packaged in recycled materials.
* Company: Good Fortune
* Location: Within the Cleveland/Bradley County Business Incubator at 3505 Adkisson Drive, suite 102, Cleveland, Tenn.
* How it's green: From the product ingredients to the recycled packaging, everything about Jennifer Jack's Good Fortune products is green, she said. "Our formulations are biodegradable and phosphate free, so they're good for the earth and the rivers, if you were to take our stuff camping," Jack said. "We also recycle all our shipping boxes. It's not necessarily the most pretty package going out, but it's recycled."
* Why do it this way? "We try to keep it simple," Jack said. One product she makes, the Three In One All Purpose Soap can be used to shave, wash hair and face, reducing the number of products you need to buy and packaging that could be wasted by buying separate products for those tasks.
* Advice for others considering green initiatives: "Seek out ways that you can be greener by taking it one step at a time," she said. "Set achievable goals. One month it might be to start a recycling program, the next month to change out the light bulbs, then the next month to change vendors that match your business philosophy. Over time, those little changes will make a big difference."
* Is environmentalism an essential part of the business and why? Environmentalism is at the core of Good Fortune. In-house, there is a recycling program where anything that can be recycled is taken to the recycle center weekly, and household items are repurposed to be used during the manufacturing process. "We actually cut the top off an old jug and use it as a funnel," Jack said. "We are constantly trying to reuse things around the house instead of spending a lot of money or buying things."
Written by Brittany Cofer at the Times Free Press
Beauty goods producer lets green ideas permeate - timesfreepress.com
