How Your Baby Can Support Green Companies From Day One: Green Strollers

Bringing a new member into the family is also adding an extra consumer to earth, so it’s important to introduce environmentally friendly products to your baby at an early age. One of the important baby items that you will invest in is a stroller.

Strollers have become a signature of a family’s lifestyle offering endless features and gadgets. It’s important to support green stroller companies as you are likely to buy more than one stroller for your growing family. So which companies should you support? We’ve selected four companies that dedicate their business methods to leaving behind a greener world in producing baby strollers. From the design of the product to their distribution methods, these companies follow Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) policies to maintain their business practices in an Eco friendly and sustainable manner.

Maclaren: Maclaren is known for their well built toddler strollers (from 3 months up to 55 lbs). They’re easy to use, lightweight and built to last. Parent’s who need a double stroller often choose the Maclaren brand for their easy to turn side-by-side seating and great maneuverable wheels. And for families who travel a lot, the Maclaren Volo Stroller is the perfect option, weighing in at only 8.8 lbs (without hood, shopping basket or rain cover) and has a weight capacity of 55lbs! The company’s international mass production and global shipment of goods is efficiently organized to make a tremendous effort in waste reduction by using recyclable materials and restricting the usage of harmful chemicals. Maclaren’s waste reduction policy includes 70% of recycled materials in all their packaging, and in three years they hope to be at 100%. They also sponsor recycling centres that accept used strollers to minimize waste in our landfills. And chemicals such as phthalates, lead, PVC, and brominated flame retardants (BFRs) have been switched to safer alternatives.

Stokke: The Stokke Xplory Complete stroller fits your new born baby up to 45 lbs. It’s termed as complete as this is the only stroller your child will ever need. This is one of the most luxurious and popular strollers on the market for their unique elevated seat and chic design, made for your child to be seated at the same height as the parent’s torso. Compared to other strollers on the market, the Stokke Xplory Complete allows your child to sit at the restaurant’s table without needing a booster seat. As an advocate of ethical trade practices, Stokke is a member of the Ethical Trading Initiative in Norway. They take a lot of initiative to supervise the development of raw materials, production and distribution methods. To be a supplier for Stokke, they require every member to co-sign a code of conduct agreement outlining joint responsibilities. As for minimizing their carbon emissions and fuel consumption, Stokke invests in warehouse hubs and the principle of transporting large stock volumes to minimize frequencies of trips.

UppaBaby: For toddler strollers UppaBaby is almost as good as Maclaren’s maneuverability, however it is a bit more affordable with additional features like a folded stand. But just like the companies above, they are devoted to developing products that are both eco-friendly and safe for your children by recycling returned service parts and setting up shipping centers on both coasts. Their company’s eco-friendly phrase is “think globally, act locally”. They’ve recently upgraded their new office with T12 high efficiency lighting and created a recycling program to replace disposable utensils by using dishware, cups and flatware instead. Their CEO Bob, at 6’3” drives a 4-cylinder fuel-efficient compact car to be a leading example of reducing emissions. UppaBaby has also teamed up with Healthy Child Healthy World, a non-profit company in creating healthy environments for children and families by supporting protective policies, educating parents and engaging with communities in responsible decision making.

Orbit Baby: Although Orbit Baby has only one stroller to choose from, they are ranked the highest in using Eco friendly materials. Using impressive materials such as organic stroller seat fabric, non-toxic safe flame retardants and even PVC-free rain shields to provide your baby a healthy environment without harming the environment. The brilliant design of the stroller offers endless convenience for parents such as a side and rear view for baby during a stroll and a one-hand fold to collapse the stroller. And finally, their impressive packaging is designed for efficient transportation and minimal waste by not using bleach, oily dyes and plastic windows .

Donate your good-condition used stroller
Supporting a green stroller company is just the first step; what you do with the stroller after will help continue minimizing waste. And to reduce the amount of strollers going into the landfill each year, donate your good-condition stroller to someone in need or to recycle it if it’s no longer usable. It’s always better to buy used than new to prevent wasting new materials as well as emissions in transporting the product.

Photo credits: bfhoyt at Flickr under a Creative Commons license; Maclaren Baby, norcalkitten, PeppyParents.com, and Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth at Flickr