(Published in March '09, Merchant Magazine and Building Products Digest)
This year may be remembered for its gargantuan financial meltdown and economic crisis. It may also be remembered as a foundational year for green home building for two big reasons. First, energy and water conservation are more important issues than ever before. With government incentives, such as rebates and weatherization financing, and water rationing looming in some regions of the country, energy and water efficiency are top of mind concerns for home owners and new home buyers. Second, green homes are selling faster than non-green homes. This has been borne out by research conducted by various local green home building programs, but a recent press release from the US Green Building Council indicates that new homes meeting the LEED for Homes standard built by Pulte in Las Vegas, are selling about twice as fast as their conventional homes. The LEED for Homes program is barely a year old and already there’s a ten-fold increase in new homes slated to be certified this year. With production home builders now taking notice, you can bet that a dramatically larger percentage of new housing starts will be green.
If a rebound in new home construction will be led by green, how can retailers position themselves to benefit? To get a broader perspective on this question, I organized a virtual roundtable discussion with some green building professionals. It seemed everyone wanted to talk about LEED for Homes and rising consumer demand. Why? While it’s not necessarily a good fit for every project, it’s a national standard and a strong brand, which is especially good for production builders. New home buyers are already looking for energy efficiency and healthy indoor air quality, so a credible national green certification for homes will help builders sell their green homes quicker, which is what we’re already seeing. And to meet the growing demand for green homes, the new professional credential, LEED AP + Homes, is rolling out this year, which will dramatically increase the number of professionals working in the area. This is precisely where retailers should take notice.
“Retailers who are serious about serving their pro customers need to get themselves educated about the changes transforming the home building industry,” says Michael Strong, president of GreenHaus Builders (www.greenhausbuilders.com) of Houston, Texas. He was one of the first to build a LEED for Homes project, 2008 NAHB Green Building Advocate of the Year, and has been building green for years. He recommends retailers have at least one staff member go through the LEED AP + Homes training and to bring the rest of the staff up to speed – floor staff and buyers. “Nothing’s more frustrating than to spec a product, educate my supplier, only come back for a second purchase to find they no longer stock the product because they didn’t understand it,” says Strong.
Education and training was also a main theme for Heather Gadonniex, LEED AP, and president of sustainability consultancy Green it Group, (www.greenitgroup.com.) “When I meet with major retailers or distributors looking for help in getting into the green building market, I find there’s enormous confusion about green building guidelines and product certifications,” she says. Part of the blame must go to product manufacturers whose sales and marketing people often add to the confusion. But retailers must ultimately know about the products their pro customers want and develop the expertise to anticipate their needs as technologies, green building guidelines and product certifications evolve. “Retailers should look for products from manufacturers who provide back up documentation to support the validity of their green product claims and, when necessary, obtain third party certification,” says Gadonniex.
While LEED for Homes is a national standard, it includes credit for locally produced materials and innovations appropriate for local conditions. Of course, there are also local and regional green building programs that very often offer a simpler alternative for local builders. According Clarke Snell, author and principal of Think Green Building, (www.thinkgreenbuilding.com), a green and natural builder in North Carolina, thinking local is the right approach. “Building for local climate conditions with locally produced materials is what builders should be focused on, therefore it should be the focus for retailers, too,” says Snell. “Selling FSC certified lumber products from the other side of the planet just doesn’t make sense.” While sourcing locally might be hard for big box chains, it could be a valuable differentiator for knowledgeable independents.
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