More new services

I want to make you all aware of a couple new services First Call will be offering.  The first is auto shipments.  Due to a new partnership, we will now be able to ship cars to and from anywhere in the United States and Internationally. 

Secondly, we will also be providing reefer services – refrigerated trucks and vans. 

Please be aware of these new services and pass the world along to anyone you feel might need them.

First Call Implementing Recycling Program in Office Building/Warehouse

One of the projects I’m working on right now is to implement a recycling program here at 12 Channel Street in the Marine Industrial Park district of South Boston.  Our landlord is the city: BRA/EDIC (The Boston Redevelopment Authority/The Economic Development and Industrial Corporation of Boston), and in my opinion, the public sector should be setting the example for the private sector on issues of sustainability.

 

For the past few months I’ve been filling up cardboard boxes with recyclable waste from my office, and then lugging the boxes back to my apartment in Brighton on Wednesday nights for pick up Thursday mornings (trash day in my neighborhood).  The hassle of this process, combined with the fact that the dumpster area of our building is always overflowing with trash and other odds and ends that won’t fit in the dumpster (think computer monitors, furniture, old exercise equipment, etc.) finally led me to the idea that this issue had to be addresses. 

 

A chance meeting at Boston’s Green Summit last Friday with Erik, the owner of Save That Stuff, made me realize that this issue can easily be rectified.  I have contacted Anthony Verani  at BRA/EDIC.  He seems amenable to the idea so hopefully we can get this ball rolling soon. 

 

If your office or place of business is lacking a recycling program I encourage you to contact Erik or Adam at Save That Stuff as well.  Their contact details are as follows:

Save That Stuff

617-241-9998

erik@savethatstuff.com

adam@savethatstuff.com

www.savethatstuff.com

New Offers and Updates

 

 

We would like to make you aware of a new offer we have for present clients:  if you refer a friend/colleague/business associate etc, you will get 50% off your next order with us.  Just make sure the friend references your business name and please try and remind us next time you call (we’ll be sure to write it down but a friendly reminder is always helpful too).  Additionally we are offering first time customers 25% off their first order.  Overall it should be a win-win for everyone!

 

Also, we just want to make everyone aware that we do offer hazmat services.  Our drivers are hazmat licensed and the trucks are properly marked.  We are trying to break into this market a bit more so any referrals for hazmat work are greatly appreciated.

 

Please be sure to check out our new First Call blog: www.firstcalltrucking.wordpress.com,

MySpace page: www.myspace.com/firstcalltrucking,

and updated website: www.firstcalltrucking.com (with more changes coming soon).

 

Finally, we are updating our client contacts.  Please send in business cards and any additional contact info to be entered into a drawing to receive a bottle of wine (type to be determined by the winner).

 

As always, we thank you for your business.

 

Overview of First Call – Scope and Services

      

 

 First Call Trucking & Courier is a family-owned and operated logistical services company available for ALL your delivery needs including: same-day, rapid, rush; scheduled and routed shipments, air-freight pick up and delivery, warehousing and distribution,  and all forms of courier services.  We operate locally in Greater Boston, throughout New England and even across the United States.

 

We are located in South Boston’s newly developed Seaport District, in the heart of Boston’s Marine Industrial Park, and about a mile away from Boston’s Logan International Airport.

 

Father/Daughter team, John and Nancy DeFazio, are both born and raised in Boston.  Their adept knowledge of the city combined with 20+ years experience in the industry is what makes First Call the best at what they do.

 

Big enough to serve you.  Small enough to know you.  Make your first call to First Call!

 

 

Why should you choose First Call?

         

• Our specialty is time sensitive deliveries.  Our drivers are dispatched immediately and sent from pick up location to desired destination directly—on time every time.

 

 

• We take pride in the quality of people we employ.  Our drivers are neat, courteous, and professional.

 

• Our fleet is comprised of cars, station wagons, vans, sport utility vehicles, and 2007 24ft CDL box trucks with lift-gates to suit all of your shipping needs.  New vehicles = reliable service—minimal delivery problems, no breakdowns, etc.

 

• We operate throughout New England and across the country, with LTL service, as needed.

 

• Our regular office hours are 8:00 AM to 5:00 PM Monday through Friday and we are on-call 7 day’s a week, 24 hours/day.

 

• We are fully licensed, and insured.

 

• Our drivers are CDL licensed and equipped with state of the art Nextel two-way radio systems and pagers, insuring prompt attention to your most critical needs.  Drivers’ cell/direct connect numbers furnished upon service for your added convenience.

 

• Our office is equipped with multiple loading docks, freight elevators, electric jacks, and 1700 square feet of storage space for your warehousing needs.

 

• Very conveniently located in South Boston’s Marine Industrial Park—less than a mile from Logan Airport, all major Massachusetts highway pickups, and directly across the street from the new Boston Convention Center.

 

• Our drivers are hazmat certified and our staff is multi-lingual: English, Spanish, Cape Verdean, Creole.

 

We have been serving many of New England’s leading companies since 1992 with professional, prompt and personal service.  Should you have any questions, please feel free to contact us by any means listed below.

                                                                                                          

The Sustainable Business Network of Boson

The Sustainable Business Network of Greater Boston is an organization of business leaders committed to promoting high ethical standards in business, a multiple-stakeholder business model, productive and fulfilling workplaces, and environmentally sustainable business practices.  We aspire to share lessons learned regarding best practices both in the workplace and in relation to our greater communities.

SBN is Greater Boston’s chapter of a network of organizations across the U.S. and Canada called the Business Alliance for Local living Economies (BALLE), which promotes business practices that support the needs of all stakeholders. SBN’s focus is on Eastern and Central Massachusetts. 

In 2006, the Responsible Business Association of Greater Boston (RBA) changed its name to the Sustainable Business Network of Greater Boston. This is more than simply a name change, our new name reflects an evolutionary change in the strategic direction of our work and in the programs in which we’re involved. 

One major shift is a stronger orientation toward bringing together businesses who promote sustainability.  We have noticed that the number of businesses committed to sustainability has grown in Greater Boston to the point where there is a critical mass. The major emphasis of SBN is to organize and bring together business leaders who want to change the world through their businesses. SBN continues to welcome for-profits, business non-profits, cooperatives and individuals to join in supporting this important work.

SBN has recognized the opportunity to make significant progress toward a sustainable world, and we have hired an executive director, Steve Jones-D’Agostino (see our home page), to help us grow this work. We are in the process of expanding her work and bringing in other staff in order to maximize our ability to reach out and impact businesses in Greater Boston.

SBN has also ramped up our work in promoting sustainability in the Greater Boston business community. We are involved in a number of important initiatives that we think are making a significant difference in our world and in our community and include:

Business Summit for a Sustainable Boston

This series of meetings brings together representatives from the City of Boston with business and non-profit leaders who are all committed to building a sustainable Boston.  One of the highlights of this work is the establishment of a City of Boston Green Business Award.  You can check out the excellent work that is being done by going to the Sustainable Boston web site.

Local First Campaigns

SBN has played an important role in seeding Local First campaigns in the Greater Boston area.  Cambridge Local First is a strong, thriving network and Somerville Local First and Worcester Local First are gaining major momentum. 

International Symposium on Spirituality and Business

SBN is an active co-sponsor of this annual event.  March 23 will be the 10th symposium, which is sponsored by Babson College.  This event features successful business leaders who place values at the forefront of managing their business.

Annual New England Conference on Socially Responsible Business

For almost 20 years, SBN and its predecessors have hosted the longest-running local conference on socially responsible business. This year’s conference will again focus on sustainability and features well-known and innovative business, government, and nonprofit leaders who are working to make a more sustainable and just world. 

Educational Programs

SBN/RBA has a long history of providing cutting edge educational programs addressing critical issues of our time. Our annual program with Boston College is just one of the many programs we hold each year to bring to light the new, innovative business practices that will help change the world. 

Specific Programs and Suburban Community Programs

SBN is moving forward on creating specific action teams of members who have a particular program that moves us toward a sustainable economy.  We welcome SBN members to start an action team that will promote sustainability.  SBN is also organizing businesses in various suburban communities — for example, a group of Metrowest businesses is in the process of formation. 

By being a member of SBN, you are supporting the important work of building a strong business community committed to economic justice and sustainability.  The benefits include:

1.  Complimentary or discounted SBN programs

2.  Listing on the home page of our website

3.  Listing in our online Marketplace directory

4.  Being a part of a sustainable community of businesses in Greater Boston

Please encourage your friends and associates to join SBN today and help us build this important community.  It’s a real value and it’s easy to join by completing the application either online or on paper.

Green Business Summit

 

Companies realize more than ever the impact they have on natural resources and the environment.  The BBJ will look into unique ways companies make changes with everything from green construction, to reducing carbon footprints, to sustainability.  This event will include a keynote speaker and panel discussions to explore best practices. A green wave is coming to businesses big and small, and a slew of local pioneers are rolling out new technologies and business policies to set Massachusetts’ course on the energy frontier. Green initiatives are everywhere, and the Boston Business Journal will explore local environmental leadership with its Green Business Report and Green Business Summit in May. Our report will include an in-depth special supplement featuring a slew of green initiatives — everything from how companies are self-auditing their energy initiatives to what the state is doing to advance its own energy agenda. Research on green investing and construction, as well as no-holds-barred take on real vs. faux green efforts, are also planned. The special supplement’s publication will correspond with the BBJ’s inaugural Green Summit event, a best-practices conference that will feature industry-leading speakers and panelists representing various corners of the business, energy, architectural and conservation sectors.   Keynote Speaker: Keynote Speaker:  Jim Gordon, CEO, Cape Wind Best Practices: Think Green, Design Green, Build Green  Moderator: Martin Madaus, PhD, CEO, Millipore Corp. Panelists: John F. Fish, CEO, Suffolk Construction Co., Inc. Steve Fugarazzo, Manager of Facilities Engineering and Enterprise Energy, Raytheon Co. Tim Healy, CEO & Founder, EnerNOC Inc.  Leith Sharp, Director, Harvard University Green Campus Initiative   Money, Technology & Policy: The State’s Green Future   Moderator: Carolyn S. Kaplan, Counsel, Chief Sustainability Officer, Nixon Peabody, LLP Panelists: Nick d’Arbeloff, Co-Executive Director, New England Clean Energy Council Christina Lampe-Onnerud, PhD, CEO & Founder, BostonPower Inc.   Chuck McDermott, General Partner, Rockport Capital Partners   Jim Walker, Managing Director, Global Insight   For information on sponsoring this event, please contact: Robert Sturtevant, Director of Sponsorship Sales at rsturtevant@bizjournals.com or 617-316-3218   $85 single ticket   |   $1,200 reserved table of 10 (Includes premier seating and table signage)   Advanced registration and payment are required for all events.  Please note, that once you register, you have purchased a non-refundable ticket. When? Friday, May 16, 2008 7:30am – 10:30am Where? Seaport Hotel 200 Seaport Blvd, Boston, MA 02210  Click here to register online

Sponsors: Premier Sponsors: Gold Sponsors:

Andrew Wolk, the founder of Root Cause and ICE, offers a business approach to social change

Andrew Wolk is founder, president, and chief executive of Root Cause, a Cambridge nonprofit that creates partnerships between the nonprofit and private sectors. He recently authored “Business Planning for Enduring Social Impact,” a how-to guide for socially entrepreneurial organizations. He spoke with Globe reporter Sacha Pfeiffer.

What exactly is Root Cause?
We are working to look for enduring solutions to social and economic problems by supporting social innovators and educating what we call social impact investors.

Do you think the general public understands what that means?
No, I don’t think they necessarily do. In laymen’s terms, we are focused on organizations that are marrying business principles with a passion for social impact, and we are trying to educate anyone who provides resources – philanthropically or otherwise – and would like to link that to measurable social impact.

What motivated you to start Root Cause?
My grandfather was a 25-year councilman in Pittsburgh who devoted his whole life to public service and actually created a great amount of change. He was considered one of the founders of smog control in the ’50s. My father was a decades-long successful Wall Street executive. I had started and sold a restaurant delivery business and found myself more attracted to what business could do in marrying those business principles with social impact. Those two worlds came together for me, and I found my purpose. In the variety of activities we do at Root Cause, the common theme is: What can we learn from the private sector? Not that the private sector does everything right. But what it has been able to do is successfully find, invest in, and scale business models. And that has created hundreds of millions of jobs and hundreds of millions of dollars of wealth. So how can we take those same concepts and find, invest in, and scale the most effective, efficient, and sustainable solutions to social problems? We fundamentally believe there are solutions out there that are working, but that we have just not created an efficient enough system to identify and support and scale the solutions that are actually working.

Do you think of nonprofits as businesses?
Yes. It’s unfortunate we have created the term nonprofit, because it’s given people a false understanding of what they are. All it really is is a tax status and nothing more. Nonprofits have revenue, balance sheets, income statements, and cash flow statements. They’re run like businesses. The only real difference is their expected outcome. In the business world, the expected outcome is return on investment. For nonprofits, the outcome should be some level of social impact according to their mission.

Some people think of nonprofits as inefficient operations. Do you think that’s a deserved stereotype?
I think you can find an inefficiency in any sector. However, there has been over the last decade a huge proliferation in the number of nonprofit organizations overall. By my recent calculation, in the last 10 years there’s been an 84 percent growth rate. Some say 115 new nonprofits start a day. If you equate that to the variety of issues we’re faced with in the country, whether poverty or access to education or healthcare, there is a significant opportunity to generally improve the efficiency, effectiveness, and sustainability of nonprofits – not unlike there has been a significant opportunity that’s been capitalized on for consulting to for-profit businesses, and even government agencies, to make them stronger and better. And the nonprofit sector is under-resourced for doing those things, which is giving Root Cause an opportunity to do its work.

Can you sum up your new book in a sentence or two?
It’s targeted primarily to existing nonprofit organizations, but we think government agencies, as well as for-profits focused on solving social problems, will find it helpful as well. The overall reason we wrote the book was not only to share our methodology, but if you go to a bookstore you’ll find countless books on how to write a business plan for a for-profit business, and all of them basically have the same outline. But there isn’t a book on how to write a business plan to solve a social problem.

What do you consider the most innovative nonprofit in the Boston area?
One of them – and I’m happy to give you other examples – is Close to Home, which is working in the domestic violence field. Close to Home’s basic premise is that without community involvement, we will be unable to solve this problem. Over the past 10-plus years, a mechanism has been put in place for people who are victims of domestic violence to go somewhere, and that is certainly an important piece to have in place. But how do we prevent domestic violence from happening in the first place? What Aimee Thompson, the founder, found is that most people who are victims of domestic violence, and most people who know about it, say nothing. If you think about what Mothers Against Drunk Driving has done, it’s now embedded in us that if we’re at a party and someone is drinking, someone asks, “Who’s driving?” It’s natural now. Amy has a very innovative model, which has been working out of Dorchester now for six or seven years, to try to make domestic violence part of the conversation.

© Copyright 2008 Globe Newspaper Company.

http://www.boston.com/business/articles/2008/05/11/a_business_approach_to_social_change/?page=full

Green Trucking is on a Roll

Taking Care of Business (taken from GreenBuzz website)

Green trucking is on a roll.

Over the past several months, we’ve seen a growing focus on the environmental impacts of transport — planes, ships, trains, and trucks, each of which has its own energy and environmental impacts. Now, with diesel fuel averaging well over $4 per gallon and increased concern about climate change, air quality, and inner-city asthma, it’s truckers’ turn to be in the spotlight.

Last week, the American Trucking Associations rolled out a sustainability program aimed at putting the brakes on fuel consumption and greenhouse gas emissions. Among other things, the group advised truckers to set speed governors on new trucks to 68 miles per hour or less, using 27 percent less fuel than when traveling at 75 miles per gallon, and avoiding some 31.5 million tons of carbon emissions. Meanwhile, several large trucking companies operating in West Coast ports announced they would switch older diesel trucks over to ones that run on cleaner liquefied natural gas to reduce air pollution.

Some companies already have steered in the direction of cleaner freight. In March, for example, Con-way said it would slow down its 8,400 trucks to 62 mph to curb fuel consumption and carbon emissions. Wal-Mart, Pitney Bowes, and DTE Energy are among firms seeking to green up their fleets. UPS , DHL, and Fedex are vying to be the greenest package-delivery company, using a variety of cleaner-trucking technologies. And dozens of truckers and shippers have joined the U.S. EPA’s SmartWay Transport Partnership.

(You can find more stories on the greening of trucks here.)

It’s a trend that’s shifting into high gear, and none too soon: The act of moving materials and finished products around the globe can represent significant sources of emissions for companies. With encouragement from customers — especially everyday business customers — we’ll no doubt see large-scale movement to big rigs with smaller impacts.

– Joel Makower, Executive Editor

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