Unplug Your Unused Appliances – A lot of people don’t realize that many appliances and chargers are still drawing power when they are not in use. From your office printer, to your bread maker and Xbox, they are all suckling at the power teat while sitting idle. By plugging these items into an energy star rated power bar, you can stop these watt sucking vampires from upping your monthly bills. While it may not seem like much, you can easily save $200/yr on your power bill.

Ditch the Bottled Water - Even though the great BPA scare made many people switch to reusable water bottles, millions of bottles of bottled water is still sold every year. Most people don’t think about all the trucks it takes to deliver all that water around the world to the grocery and convenience stores. Not only can you save a bundle buy purchasing an in house filtration system, but you are reducing the amount of bottles that go into the trash or have to be recycled. This way you can have convenient, fresh filtered water anytime you want, but you help to reduce green house gases (Sorry, it won’t help with your ’significant others’ gasses).

Buy Local, Go Organic – In the same vain as bottled water, it takes millions of gallons of gas to deliver fresh produce and other food products around the globe. By buying locally grown, organic produce you are not only supporting and investing in your local economy, but you are helping to reduce carbon emissions from large trucks barreling down the highways.

Resource Sharing – Take a look around your garage and basement. How many of these things did you ‘have to have’ at the time, and now they are collecting dust. How many items do you own that are used once or twice a year, and sit idle the rest of the time. Why can’t your friends or neighbors borrow or rent these items from you for a small fee? Why do we have this crazy idea we need to own EVERYTHING when there are surely 5-10 of them within blocks of your house. Save some money, save some space and get to know your neighbors!

Ditch the Credit Cards – While many will say that this is more money saving than reducing your carbon footprint, think again. Of course you will save money, but since credit cards make over-spending so much easier, you end up contributing more waste from all those products you bought. And as with other items in this list, they had to get to the store somehow! You will be reducing greenhouse emissions.  A few tips to keep from spending: Leave the credit cards at home unless you absolutely need them. If you have a serious credit card addiction, you might want to put your assets on ice, literally. Put yours cards in a Tupperware container filled with water and put it in the freezer, that way if you have a sudden urge to spend, you have time to walk yourself down while the cards are defrosting (Don’t try putting it in the microwave either, it will melt your cards!)!

These are just a few of the things you can do to reduce your carbon footprint and your spending. What tricks do YOU use in your day to day life? Post additional ideas to share in the comments.

With Freecycle, you have 2 options, give and receive. You can post an item for somebody to take, or post something you are looking for. That’s it. Moderators have been known to be almost militant at times when people don’t follow these strict rules. But what about the people that want to do more with their stuff? They Can BorrowMe!

Similar to the Freecycle network, BorrowMe.com allows users to post items they want, or have to give away, but with many more options and control.

So if you’re upset with Freecycle and and are looking for alternatives, come check out BorrowMe.com and take it for a spin!

The boss actually ran into this problem himself a few weeks ago when attempting to acquire a washer and dryer he got from some friends. While they only needed to travel a few kilometers, loading up the BorrowMe Mobile (Smart Car) was out of the question. At a loss, he posted a Wish on BorrowMe for the assistance of a pickup-truck for an hour or so. Once listed, he chose to also post to Facebook with our usefull ‘Post to Facebook’ option, which turned out to be a smart choice.

Because he has well over a hundred people on his Facebook Friends list (Which greatly outweighs his 30-ish friends on BorrowMe.com), the post was seen by many more people. While he did not get a response from his friends on BorrowMe, he had 3 responses from different people within 24 hours from people on Facebook! Some people think that because BorrowMe doesn’t have a million members, they won’t get their wish or won’t be able to get rid of an item they have. Turns out they were wrong!

The power of BorrowMe’s social integration with Facebook allows you to get your wishes and items out to a much larger group of people you know, or people you know through somebody else (One of the people that responded to his plea was actually a friend of a friend). This goes to show that using the Post to Facebook feature on the site will get more eyes on your stuff, but that there are many people that are willing to help out another human being, even if it’s a friend of a friend.

BorrowMe is a way for people to get to know their friends and neighbors better, to build better communities and to use that closeness to help reduce the amount of stuff that goes to landfills, make some return on those seldom used big ticket items and to save money! It’s a small step, but it’s a step in the right direction. The more people see that the system works, the more likely they are to use it. The more friends they have doing it, the more chance they will get on board as well. So the next time you are in need of something, even if you think it’s small, try posting on BorrowMe and see what you can get!

Wouldn’t it be nice to lend one of your co-workers the latest season of Desperate Housewives so you can add another person to your gossip group at work? What about letting the guy two cubicles down your jigsaw to make those cool shelves his daughter wants for her birthday? It’s not hard to turn a stagnant office place into an area of friendship and closeness with a minimal amount of effort. It will not only benefit the employees, but happier workers will also benefit the company as a whole!

We have all sorts of idle items laying around our house; from TV on DVD to movies and video games. Why not do some in office trading and lending? It saves you from dropping $50 on that game you will finish in a week, or save you from spending $80 on that Hard Cover novel you have been dying to read. Resource sharing with co-workers gives you more piece of mind than dealing with strangers. Many people find they are more comfortable lending to people they are familiar with, and you can’t get more familiar than the people you work with!

With so many people hit during the recession, many families are starting to open their eyes to new and less conventional methods of saving money and reducing their consumption. Resource sharing at work, and in their neighborhood makes a lot of sense for everybody involved, and helps to reduce the amount of stuff that ends up in landfills. It’s a win-win-win situation. As Sheldon Mopes (Edward Norton) said in Death To Smootchy, “You can’t change the world but you can make a dent.”, Let’s make some dents people!

Think of all the unused stuff in these apartments.

Think about this. A majority of condo and apartment complexes have anywhere from 50-100 units. For arguments sake, let’s say you live in one of those complexes with 50 units – that leaves 49 units of other people. How many people do you know in those 49 other units? For most people, it’s one or two, though with only slightly more interactions that the previously mentioned waves. Now think about this. How many of those units (And storage units) are filled with books, blenders, punch bowls, back-packs, strollers, stud finders, sleeping bags, videos games, bikes, movies… I’m sure you get the idea.

With just a minimal bit of effort, a hello or some minor chit chat, you can start to build relationships with your neighbors, start building a community! Is it really so bad to get to know your neighbors? Sure, there are a few bad apples out there, but why should that spoil everything for everybody else.

Why not start a group for your building and get people involved. Start with a few people you see or talk to on a regular basis. Tell them what you’re doing, explain that it’s not just a way to get to know your neighbors; but a way to save money, consume less and send less waste to the landfills. We give you the tools to lend, rent, sell or gift your items to others (And keep track of it all!). Start small, lend out a book, or a movie and see where things go, people might actually surprise you!

What are you waiting for? Start your own group today!

Imagine an online network of people so generous and resourceful that they lend and lease their unused belongings to people in their communities who actually need them. It almost sounds too good to be true.

Such a system of borrowing, however, already exists in Charlottesville, and it is growing everyday.

With all the perks of popular Web sites like Craigslist and Amazon, BorrowMe.com allows students, small organizations and other “frugal folks” to enjoy the convenience of borrowing the items they need, without the purchase price, safety concerns and hassles of cross-country shipping.

Created in 2005, BorrowMe began in Calgary, Canada as a way for people to save money on items like textbooks, furniture and cookware.

The idea for the company started with a Spiderman DVD and a close friend, CEO and Founder Sean Young said.

“I was walking to the rental store when I bumped into one of my friends,” he said. “We chatted and I revealed where I was going and why. He later suggested that I just borrow his entire Spiderman DVD collection instead of buying it.”

Everyone appreciates saving a few bucks here and there, Young said. Why not take the idea one step further?

“If I had X-ray vision and could look through all of these peoples’ garages, I’d find all of these piles of stuff that we all collect,” he said. “Who really uses all of the junk in their basement or garage? On average, how much dust does it collect? If everyone could share the things they didn’t use with people they chose, money would be saved and those items would be put to great use. Life would be a whole lot cheaper and everyone would be happy.”…

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Posted on 23 September 2009

New website “helps students borrow, lend, or rent anything from anybody”

Amy Szybalski

“Imagine a world where you bought as little as possible, borrowed as much as possible, got as much use from what you already own as possible, and brought as little as possible – to the dump”: this is the goal of a new social networking website. BorrowMe.com helps connect people, mainly students, with others who may be willing to lend some of their possessions.

“A lot of students have just left home for the first time, and are setting up in new digs. They need everything from pots and pans to a couch, a stereo, textbooks, maybe a used car or course supplies. Money’s tight, and every penny counts,” says Sean Young, chief architect of the program.

On BorrowMe you create your own profile, a home page if you will, that keeps you up to date on your BorrowMe activities and inventory. There you can read comments, see new people in your friends list, and get updated with items of interest in your area.

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With the economy in a downward spiral, borrowing instead of buying seems like an ideal plan. BorrowMe.com provides a borrowing and lending service where users can share things ranging from textbooks to digital cameras.

BorrowMe.com founder Sean Young had the idea in 2005, but did not release the site until earlier this year.

“When the economy went south around a year and a half ago I got back together with some people to discuss the project,” Young said. “And a little over a year ago we started working on the site again.”

Now the site has more than 1,000 users and hundreds of opportunities for users to share, anything from textbooks to vacuum cleaners…

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