We all know that a more sustainable business is a more efficient business which in turn means a more profitable business. Now how do you become more efficient and sustainable if you have no money to make those changes? These projects are some of the first things we look at with our customers to make some money for bigger projects further down the line. By the end of this article, you should have a great understanding of how to implement super low investment or no investment sustainability and efficiency initiatives into your small business to help you improve your profitability!

1. Turn the fricking lights off! This is the easiest thing you can do to improve your efficiency. If you are not using it, whether it’s lights, computer, car, whatever, if you are not using it, turn it off! This costs you no money to initially implement and will save you money. Now, does this save you thousands of dollars every day? Well, it depends. At large enough scales or when paired with other initiatives it absolutely can, and that is the key with these initiatives, just one won’t do much but when you make 10, 20, 30 small changes over enough time you will see big savings from them.

2. Don’t use a power washer to wash your hands. There are so many times that I go to a business, and I open their sinks to see the pressure and it is so high that I get splashed from 2 feet away. You do not need a power washer to wash your hands. So, if you have a sink as strong as a power washer, put up a sign telling people not to the sink open too far. I recommend you get comedic with this so that you get engagement with it. Make a funny sign to encourage people to use less pressure on the sink and you’ll see a reduction in your water usage.

3. Settings. Now we get into a permanent fix, change all the default settings on every aspect of your business to be the most sustainable and efficient. Set the printer to print single sided, put the monitors on energy efficient settings, set the climate control on the vehicles to be at its most efficient settings. Whether people care or don’t care about you saving money, if you make the easiest option for everyone the one that saves you money, they won’t bother switching it. Take advantage of this and make all your defaults the most efficient.

Those are the three easiest ways to improve your efficiency and sustainability without spending any money at all. These are bandaid solutions though (especially 1 and 2) so we typically implement these practices as we are working on a permanent fix like automatic light switches, lower flow sinks, etc. Since these initiatives cost nothing to implement, get started! Go ahead and start making your business more efficient! If you want to have the money to make bigger changes, check out our free e-book on small business finances for big profits, it’s another free resource to improve your efficiency!