Maid Brigade Exhibits at Green Summit in Phoenix

I’m just back from a “green” expo in Phoenix, AZ titled The Green Summit.  It was organized by this 23-year-old dynamo Arizona State University grad student, Chris Samila.  In its second year, The Green Summit brings both consumers and professionals interested in green living together with companies that offer green products and services.  The un-official theme of the show was “Just Change One Thing.”
As a green house cleaning service, Maid Brigade exhibited at this event, and even brought our Green Living Expert and nationally acclaimed author, Annie Bond, who delivered the closing keynote address titled “Reality Check”.   Her talk was about giving yourself permission to go green and then, after doing so, sharing various ways that consumers can go green and helping consumers find products and services that actually ARE green.  Even well-intentioned businesses market green products or services that may, in fact, not be all that green. For example, the folks in the booth next to us were selling bath products that they claimed were organic, vegan, vegetarian etc etc yet the products were laden with artifical fragrances and dyes.  Fragrances are a prime factor, however, making products NOT green! 
Artificial fragrance is a major contributor to poor indoor air quality.  Fragrances have chemicals that actualy suspend an artificial odor in the air and these chemical additives can trigger allergy and asthma attacks as well as other ailments.  We all had headaches by lunchtime since the fragrances coming off their products was SO strong. 
My point is that if companies selling products and services, and even green exhibit organizers, are having trouble understanding what is truly “green”, how is a consumer going to know?  It’s especially hard when it comes to green cleaning because certain formulas are protected as proprietary and consequently, not all ingredients are disclosed in the label of household cleaning products.  Fragrances are a good example, but not the only one. 
Maid Brigade uses cleaning solutions that are certified by Green Seal, an organization that establishes standards for green products in several categories, to help protect consumers from false marketing claims about green products and services. In fact, they are now writing a green standard for house cleaning services.  Maid Brigade has been participating on a panel to advise them, from our experiences in literally thousands of customer homes with our exclusive Green Clean Certified(TM) system, on practical considerations related to what products, equipment and functions we use to effectively clean our customers’ homes.  As the first house cleaning service to go green on a national scale, it’s exciting to be recognized by Green Seal for our market leadership and to be part of this process.