There are few things more exciting to us here at Springwise than seeing good ideas come together, and that's exactly what we had occasion to spot earlier this month. Zipcar—the car-sharing innovator we've covered on numerous occasions already—just announced a partnership with Zimride—also no stranger to our pages—to bring an integrated ride-sharing system to college and university campuses.

Debuting a few weeks ago at Stanford University, the integrated service combines Zipcar's car-sharing program with Zimride's Facebook-based carpool matching system to make it easier for college students, faculty and staff to seek, offer and share rides. Zipcar already operates car-sharing programs at more than 120 US colleges and universities. To share a ride, members reserving a car can now automatically post the date, time and destination of their trip to the Zimride campus community online. Zimride's route-matching algorithm takes over from there, finding and notifying users looking for such a ride. Zimride members, meanwhile, can now find a local Zipcar to share through a customized campus Zimride website or Facebook application, making it possible for them to carpool even if they don't own a car. Zipcar CEO Scott Griffith explains: "We chose to partner with Zimride because their innovative and scalable platform is a great foundation for building a national network of rides. Zipcar fills the car ownership gap for the Zimride model, since people most likely to ride-share are those that are least likely to own a car." The two companies aim to roll out the integrated service to many more campuses in the coming months.

Every Zipcar takes 15 to 20 privately owned vehicles off the road, while Zimride has enabled 20 percent carpool adoption and savings of more than 500,000 lbs of CO2 and USD 200,000 in vehicle operating costs, the companies say. Add to that the fact that there are some 13 million faculty, staff and students on more than 2,500 parking-strapped campuses nationwide, according to the US Department of Education, and the potential impact becomes clear. How long before something like this comes to large companies, urban areas and the rest of the congested world...?

Websites: www.zipcar.com — www.zimride.com
Contacts: universities@zipcar.com — info@zimride.com

Following a multimillion pound refurbishment, and using little more than seawater, SEA LIFE London Aquarium ran a (close to) zero-impact advertising campaign in the streets of London earlier this week.

You might recognize the masterminds behind the campaign: Curb, the media agency that uses natural materials to build brand awareness for its clients. (We previously wrote about their sand sculptures, turf cutting and snow tagging innovations.) Dubbed 'sea tagging', Curb's newest tool simply entails spraying seawater through custom-made stencils. Salt water evaporates more slowly than fresh water, and the stencilled graphics are visible for 5–15 minutes up to two hours.

For Monday's SEA LIFE campaign, over 2,000 images of sea turtles, sharks and seahorses were sprayed on streets, walls and sidewalks in 300 locations by a team of taggers dressed in scuba diving gear. Since the adverts are temporary and consist of nothing but water, Curb didn't have to worry about permission or permits.

Considering the amount of visual clutter in public spaces that's created by non-stop marketing efforts, a campaign that leaves nothing behind but a dusting of seasalt is as appealing for aesthetic reasons as it is for its low impact on the environment. While it may not work in hot cities, we expect to see sea tagging appear (and disappear) in other parts of the world soon.

Website: www.mindthecurb.com
Contact: info@mindthecurb.com

There's no doubt eating locally grown food benefits both the community and the environment, but without regular visits to a farmers' market, it can be difficult for consumers to make that happen. We've already covered a few innovative ways companies are helping homegrown produce get into consumers' hands—delivery by bicycle, to name just one—and recently we learned of another: Washington state's Ferry Farm Stand.

Beginning June 25, the Ferry Farm Stand will open every Wednesday evening at the Bainbridge Island ferry terminal, offering Seattle commuters a variety of locally grown produce in convenient USD 5 bags. Commuters arriving on the island via the busy 4:40 pm and 5:30 pm ferries will then be able to grab a bag of fresh local lettuce, some crisp sugar snap peas or a box of sweet, island-grown strawberries before they get in their car or board their bus or bike. The effort is a project of local nonprofit group Sound Food in partnership with Sustainable Bainbridge and the Chamber of Commerce, and is designed to encourage local residents to eat more food grown close to home. All of the food sold at the Ferry Farm Stand will be picked fresh at farms on Bainbridge Island and nearby North Kitsap. Sound Food is providing all of the staffing, organization and promotional support, allowing 100 percent of the proceeds to go directly to the farmers.

Sound Food founder Sallie Maron explains: “We wanted to find a way to make it easy for people to buy local food—especially those who can’t make it to the Farmers' Market on Saturday. What better place than right where they get off the boat on their way home to dinner?”

Indeed, bringing the produce to consumers—rather than expecting them to find it themselves—and then pricing it for a speedy transaction is a clever approach that looks ripe for emulation anywhere local produce is grown. Imagine the response in the subways of New York City, London or Singapore! Seems to us bringing *enough* produce would then become the real challenge.

Website: www.soundfood.org
Contact: info@soundfood.org

Spotted by: Chelsea Green

British supermarket chain Waitrose dates back to the early 1900s, when bicycle and horse and cart were its chosen methods of delivery. Now—proving once again the old adage that everything that goes around comes around—much the same methods have returned as part of the company's efforts to reduce its carbon footprint.

Waitrose has already appeared on our pages once before for its customer-directed giving program, and earlier this year it launched a series of new green initiatives that include eco-minded handcarts and bicycles for use delivering groceries to local consumers. At the store in Bury St. Edmunds, Suffolk, for example, eco-handcarts have been added as a way to help boost the number of delivery slots available to customers without increasing the number of vans on the road. The specially designed carts are intended for use delivering to customers who live within a mile of the store, and can keep products frozen and chilled for up to two hours. Waitrose branches in Lichfield, Parkstone and Droitwich, meanwhile, have also introduced eco-bicycles following a successful trial last year at Waitrose Cambridge. The eco-bicycles are electric bikes with a maximum distance charge of 30 miles, and are intended for delivery to customers who live within 15 miles of the store. Finally, in a bid to help consumers adopt greener habits themselves, Waitrose has also introduced cycle trailers for loan at 36 of its stores. The trailers are loaned out free of charge to any customers who wish to use them, the company says.

It's no longer unusual to see smaller stores using bicycles for delivery, but for a large national chain like Waitrose to embrace such methods is a testament to the growing demand for greener deliveries. Other grocers around the world: turn off your engines! ;-) (Related: Cargo bikes for greener business deliveries — Bicycle trailers on loan at IKEA — Local produce, delivered by bicycle.)

Website: www.waitrose.com
Contact: customer_service@waitrose.co.uk

Spotted by: Raymond Kollau

No sooner did we post our story about Fortnum & Mason's rooftop beekeeping effort in London than one of our readers alerted us to a similar one under way across the ocean. This time, it's atop a Toronto hotel, and the resulting honey is being used to supply the hotel's restaurant kitchen.

Last summer the Fairmont Royal York hotel installed a three-hive apiary 14 stories up above the streets of Toronto. Affectionately named the Honey Moon Suite, The Royal Sweet and The V.I.Bee Suite, the three hives are home to as many queens and their accompanying entourage of more than 10,000 other bees, each of whom forages for nectar in the hotel's decade-old rooftop herb garden and on nearby Toronto Island. The apiary was established in partnership with the Toronto Beekeepers Cooperative and FoodShare, and is a natural extension of the hotel's herb garden, Executive Chef David Garcelon says. It's also part of the hotel's commitment to sustainable hotel management through its Green Partnership program. Garcelon explains: “You can’t find a supplier much closer than your own roof. Our colonies deliver irresistible honey for our guests, while promoting our ecological commitment to bee culture.”

The three hives had produced a total of 378 pounds of honey by last fall and won 2nd place in the Liquid Honey Amber category at the 86th annual Royal Agricultural Winter Fair in November. Response from hotel patrons, meanwhile—who can learn about the source of the hotel's honey via the restaurant menu and also via its monthly audio podcasts—has been so positive that the hotel plans to install three more hives this summer. Similar efforts are also under way at The Fairmont Algonquin in St. Andrews, New Brunswick, and The Fairmont Waterfront in Vancouver.

All of which, of course, is further proof that consumers love things that are (still) made here, wherever that may be. One part hyperlocal production, one part storytelling skill, and you've got a winning recipe for sweet success! ;-)

Website: www.fairmont.com/royalyork
Contact: royalyorkhotel@fairmont.com

Spotted by: Dana