When Green products first entered the office supply lexicon, one of the easiest changes office suppliers made was to offer recycled paper products. After all, this was something that office buyers used in large quantities and was easy to transition to. But that was several years ago, and buyers are looking for more of their office-related purchases to be environmentally friendly. Jay Mutschler, president of the Broomfield, Colo.-based office supplier Corporate Express, says recycled paper is just the start.

Within the past year, Mutschler says the calls from customers to "go Green" have only gotten louder. More customers have been asking Corporate Express about its Green practices, and as a result, the company is working within its own product lines as well as outside suppliers.

"Businesses not only want Green products but they expect their supplier to operate in a sustainable fashion," he says. "We're increasingly getting asked about our suppliers in our supply chain and what we're doing on sustainable forestry on the paper side."

In fact, Mutschler points out that some buyers may be implementing Green buying strategies and not even be aware of it. For example, supplier consolidation has some Green benefits. "We have continued to see a trend towards customers wanting to bring purchases together and try to leverage their costs and reduce the overhead costs that are associated with multiple suppliers," Mutschler says.

Consolidating the office products spend with fewer suppliers provides a volume-based edge at the negotiation table, but it also reduces the number of product shipments and, thus, carbon emissions. Reduced or consolidated shipments are mutually beneficial, as they cut down on Corporate Express' costs as well, so suppliers are especially keen to work with customers on that front.

"We want to help them in order frequency and to consolidate orders, as it's good for them and it's good for us," he says.

The expanded catalog offerings also provide more areas in which to go Green. While office supplies used to mean mostly paper goods, many supplier companies have added furniture and computer peripherals to their product lines. "Specialty computer-related products are now becoming almost staple items," Mutschler says. "That's probably the biggest trend that we've seen—small peripherals that you once would have seen in a specialty catalog are now moving along into office supplies."

Corporate Express consults with furniture suppliers to develop sustainability into product components like wood and fabric, for example. Corporate Express just launched a private-label janitorial line that it markets as "environmentally-preferred," saying the cleaning formulas the company developed in-house have a much lower environmental and human health impact than traditional cleaning products.

And buying online, while providing more streamlined ordering, is also a very Green buying strategy, as it minimizes the use of paper catalogs and forms. For example, Corporate Express' online ordering tool, E-Way, features its full product catalog online. Today, more than 70% of Corporate Express' business comes through that site and the number continues to grow. With that in mind, the company is adding more features to the site, including an optional capability to suggest "switch and save" products—which will suggest a private label or less expensive alternative to any product a buyer might select in the catalog.

"More customers are moving towards the Internet—using the e-commerce platform to interact with the company and checking inventories," says Mutschler.

For more Green procurement best practices, see Purchasing.com's Green buying archive at www.purchasing.com/green.