Like any true New Yorker, newly minted “Green Entrepreneur” Elissa Olin loves her city, and particularly the Bedford-Stuyvesant —or Bed-Stuy as it’s known locally—neighborhood where she lives with her partner Bill Hauser. Although her studies and her career as an actor have taken Olin all over the country, “I grew up in the East Village, and when I moved here to Bed-Stuy, I felt like I was coming home,” she says. One of the things she loves best is the neighborhood’s diversity: “You’ve got everyone here—blue collar workers, artists, new folks, old folks, kids, dogs and a whole lot of ethnic diversity.” But one thing her beloved neighborhood lacked was easy access to ecologically friendly products and produce. “We were really interested in making our home greener, but it was incredibly inconvenient,” she recalls. “We were so busy with our lives and our careers.” And though the couple lives in an area with easy access to public transportation, they found opportunities to pick up the products they needed and wanted were few and far between, and involved time-consuming trips across the city.

“Smaller stores and national chains carried limited supplies or none at all. Specialty stores were outside of our neighborhood.”

Olin believed whole-heartedly in doing what she could to lessen her impact on the environment and she was certain that her neighbors, no matter what their backgrounds, ages or income levels, felt the same.

But doing right by the planet, she mused, shouldn’t be a chore. In fact, it ought to be as effortless and hassle-free as purchasing products that had the opposite effect.

One day, as Olin was walking her dog near the neighborhood bodega (a New York term for a small neighborhood grocery/convenience store) she had an epiphany.

“I had this idea that what the neighborhood needed was a ‘green’ store, but there was no one-stop shopping option for eco-friendly products nearby. We were ready for it, but it didn’t yet exist.”

And despite the fact that she’d never run her own retail business before, didn’t know how to begin and lacked the start-up funds, she decided to open one herself.

Thus, Green in BKLYN was born.
 

Fast and Furious: Becoming a Green Entrepreneure The road to actually getting the store up and running was littered with challenges, of course. But nearly every step of the way, Olin found the resources she needed to take the next step. When she approached a local neighborhood council to ask for support, they were happy to oblige. But she says, “They wanted me to have a business plan. I had no idea how to write a business plan.”

Luckily for her, assistance was virtually next door. Through CAMBA , a non-profit organization offering a broad range of services to improve the quality of life and business and educational opportunities in Brooklyn, Olin enrolled in 10-week business plan writing class.

Once she had her rough draft finished, her CAMBA instructors encouraged her to submit it to the PowerUP Business Plan competition, funded by the Brooklyn Public Library. She won second prize and $5000.

She spent hours scouring the area for a suitable location to open her business, but everything was either too expensive or too remote. After months of searching, she stumbled on the perfect spot.

“It was great. It was across the street from a health food store, right next to an African boutique and a bank.” But it was occupied.

Undeterred, Olin spoke with one of the neighboring business owners and discovered that the doctor who occupied it was retiring. So she called the rental agency, arranged a meeting and after presenting her business plan and financials, signed the lease.

“We opened on Earth Day,” she says proudly.

Today, her shop (run with the assistance of her dedicated intern Cristina Valentin) is well stocked with all manner of green supplies: eco-friendly cleaning products, kitchen supplies, beauty products, kids’ toys, coffee, chocolates, crafts and books. And her inventory continues to grow as customers come in with requests or she discovers a new eco-friendly solution to a home-based challenge. The shop’s interior is warm, clean and inviting, and built entirely with recovered and recycled materials. “I wanted people to know that you could reuse things and still have a lovely, clean, inviting space.”

Her neighbors stop by, drawn in by the store’s funny, funky, innovative and ever-changing window dressing and stay to chat. They ask questions and offer suggestions, just as Olin hoped.

For those of her customers interested in learning more about living green, Olin also hosts the Green in BKLYN website, complete with a blog that offers up green news, information and eco-friendly tips on everything from lowering your water use to the impact of anti-bacterial soaps on the environment.

Ultimately, Olin says, while she isn’t going to get rich as a community shopkeeper, the whole experience is helping to fulfill an ambition she’s had since her days as an undergrad at Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio.

Horace Mann, an early leader in education and one of the college’s founder’s, encouraged students to “Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity.” And though he addressed the remark to the graduating class of 1859, it was an ethos the college and its subsequent students kept alive over the intervening years.

“I’ve always had that quote going through my head, somewhere in the back of my mind,” Olin says. “Maybe this is my way of fulfilling that.”



- Take me back home -