Don’t you just love when a good thing gets even better? If you like Target (and who doesn’t?), you are going to love the expanded Target Subscriptions.

Did you know Target has a subscription service? Well, yes they do. And, as with all things Target, it’s a dandy. Think Amazon, but only the stuff you shop in person on the regular.

The best part of Target’s subscription program is that it includes beauty products. And Targ carries some quality beauty that is also pure and safe. Yep, products free from harmful ingredients, from one of your favorite stores, sent directly to your home, on a regular basis. Definitely a better-your-life trick to add to your beauty resolutions list this year.

We’re all busy. How convenient to get your most used items delivered? The upshot is not just that you will never find yourself out of your special stash, but it will even save you some green.

How does that happen? Aside from the impulse buying you will not be taking part in by frequenting the actual store less often, Target offers some pretty special savings to its subscription members. You’ll get 5% off all orders, free shipping, plus an additional 5% off when you use your REDcard. You pick your items and set the delivery schedule.

Now, let’s get back to shopping those healthy products. Add these to your Target Subscriptions.

Burt’s Bees Mama Bee Nourishing Body Oil // The perfect skin conditioner, pregnant or not. Made with sweet almond and lemon oils, and vitamin E to support and hydrate skin.

Burt’s Bees Lip Balm // These beeswax based balms are smooth, super conditioning, and taste great. Stock up and stash them in desks, drawers, gym bags, purses, backpacks…

SheaMoisture Raw Shea Butter infused with Frankincense & Myrrh // Perfect for calming and repairing dry skin. Use on body, hands, and feet for the whole family.

SheaMoisture Lemongrass & Ginger Hand & Body Scrub // Exfoliate, moisturize, and soothe with this invigorating sugar scrub. Use on hands and feet too.

Honest Organic Belly Balm // Formulated for pregnant bellies, but this gentle balm is suitable for anyone. Use to soften and heal skin.

Honest All Natural Hand Sanitizer Gel with Aloe // Keep one in the car and another near sinks to keep hands (little and big) clean and germ free. Mild scent.

Honest Mandarin Foaming Hand Soap // Lightly scented citrus soap that gets hands clean sans the harsh chemicals.

Check out all of our recommendations here: 

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Delivery, Please! Why Online Shopping May be Better for the Environment

Image of woman receiving delivery via Shutterstock

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It isn’t easy being green. Sometimes, adopting eco-friendly habits — whether avoiding plastic bags or researching sustainable food options — only seems to add more stress to our already hectic lives.

But one green habit might be as easy as skipping next Sunday’s grocery trip. A study published in the Journal of the Transportation Research Forum reveals that grocery delivery is easier not only on you, but on the planet, too. Using Seattle as a model, engineers at the University of Washington found that delivery service trucks generated 20 to 75 percent less carbon dioxide than personal vehicles driven to and from the grocery store.

While zero emissions are ideal, grocery delivery offers a conveniently green option for those who don’t live walking or biking distance from a store.

It turns out that delivery services also help grocery companies green their wallets. Goodchild and study lead author Ericka Wygonik, a Ph.D. candidate in civil and environmental engineering at the University of Washington, observed that delivery service providers produced up to 90 percent less carbon dioxide if they used routes that delivered to groups of residences, rather than individual households at separate delivery times.

These results come at a time when several grocery outlets have begun to offer delivery services. Safeway, which has more than 1,600 stores across the U.S. and Canada, offers a delivery service, while online grocer FreshDirect delivers to homes and offices in the New York City area. And Peapod makes home and business deliveries in the Midwest. Google’s even jumped on the bandwagon, revealing plans last month to pilot a same-day shopping delivery service — Google Shopping Express — in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Goodchild and Wygonik’s study raises the possibility of government or industry incentives for online grocery shopping. In future studies, they plan to investigate the effects of doing double-duty and combining grocery trips with work commutes. They’ll also look at how a delivery service’s home base location could influence emissions. – Melissa Pandika

This article appears courtesy of Sierra Magazine

Image: freshdirect

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Haven’t gotten into online shopping yet? You may want to make the shift if you care about the environment.

Ooooh, the thrill of opening up the front door to find a mysterious brown box, carefully taped shut and stamped with the Amazon logo or the address of a far-away eBay seller. Very few delights in life compete with the simple pleasure of getting a package, even when you already know what’s inside. Fortunately for delivery-lovers such as me, ordering products online for home shipping is, in fact, among the most environmentally-friendly ways to shop. And while it’s still important to consume less to preserve the planet, it makes sense to procure those items you really need with a few clicks of the mouse instead of trekking down to the brick-and-mortar store.

The folks at Pittsburgh’s Carnegie Mellon Green Design Institute studied the environmental impact of shopping online at Buy.com versus traditional in-person shopping; they found that hitting the Internet for supplies and gifts creates 35 percent less greenhouse gas and energy waste than traditional shopping. During the online shopping portion of the experiment, the majority of environmental damage occurred during packing and “last-mile” delivery. For retail stores, most of the emissions came from customers driving to the store and back.

For a product to reach a retail destination, it must first be shipped to a distributing center, then to a warehouse and finally to the store itself. In the online shopping world, there’s often no need for a warehouse—after clicking “confirm order,” a distribution center gets the message and ships your book, bath towels or knee-high boots directly to you. Combined with the fact that you don’t need to leave home to pick up your goodies, this translates to a significant environmental savings.

Of course, this study only reflects the Buy.com shipping model, and some online retailers may use less eco-friendly shipping practices. Plus, there are still some situations when it’s greener to stay local. For example, if you’re after a hemp T-shirt and that boutique down the street happens to sew its own, it’s probably far greener to drive a mile and buy the locally-manufactured item than to order online—after all, that shirt has never seen a factory, distribution center or warehouse. Bike there to score even more green points.

On a positive note, more people are buying online than ever, helping to reduce the environmental impact of shopping. According to Bloomberg, experts predict a 45 percent increase in e-commerce between 2012 and 2016. And with online sales in 2012 totaling $327 billion worldwide, that promises to be an impressive leap indeed.

Not to bust the party, but there is one important point to hammer home: There’s really no such thing as “green” shopping. Every item you purchase takes resources from the earth, and is probably manufactured in an energy-guzzling factory and treated with toxic chemicals. Then it’s packaged in wrapping that uses even more resources before it’s shipped—sometimes halfway across the world—to distributors. And that’s before you even see the product. Green consumption is minimal consumption, so don’t forget about the environmental price tag that comes with every bar of soap or cute pair of skinny jeans you spot on Amazon.

Image: lemonhalf

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