A riddle: What is oblong, gray, weighs 13 pounds, and shows up on your doorstep?
Hint: It looks like this:
Hard to guess? It can be opened to reveal..... THIS!
It's a mailing from Restoration Hardware that arrived a couple of days ago on our humble doorstep, dropped there by a UPS deliveryman staggering under its weight. It's the firm's "Collection of Source Books" (catalogs).
What an immense waste of paper and an insult to the environment!
Or is it? Restoration Hardware claims that this shipment of all this stuff is an ecological marvel, because shipping it all at once in one package is greener than doing it piecemeal; that the paper they use is from sustainable sources; and that they have shipped it via UPS "carbon neutral" delivery. You can find out more about these programs on the RH and the UPS websites -- www.rh.com and www.ups.com. (Oh, and by the way, it's all recyclable. Duh.)
I certainly applaud the fact that there ARE programs like these nowadays - "forest certified" paper and "carbon-neutral" shipping. And it's nice that Restoration Hardware is striving to be environmentally aware. I believe it was The Grinch who once said, "it's hard to be green." But ... in this case, wouldn't it be better somehow just to not print it or ship it? Especially if someone hadn't requested it?
You be the judge. My judgment is that I'll ask them to take me off their mailing list.
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