why certification?

It’s easy to make a green promise about a product or company and create a leafy logo to promote it.  It’s not as easy to get verification from a 3rd-party that your promise is true. Especially when the 3rd-party is an independent non-profit with decades of experience.

The Green Seal cannot be bought, it must be earned, and our transparency lets purchasers know exactly what has been done to protect health and the planet. The reputation of your brand as well as ours depends on that credibility.

how companies benefit

By certifying, and promoting your environmentally responsible product, service or company, you can:

• Improve the environment by reducing toxic pollution and waste, conserving resources and habitats, and minimizing global warming and ozone depletion
• Increase the health and well-being of your customers, particularly those most affected by product choice, such as schoolchildren, service staff, and the elderly
• Demonstrate that environmentally responsible products and services can meet or exceed performance and quality expectations 
• Gain access to new customers and high-value niche markets
• Increase customer loyalty among your core clientele
• Improve community relations
• Boost your profitability and enhance your brand

Green Seal certification represents real and verified environmental improvement. Peer-reviewed research shows reduced impacts resulting from products and services meeting the requirements for certification. 

• A life cycle assessment study comparing conventional institutional cleaning products and GS-37-compliant institutional cleaning products showed that the GS-37-compliant products had less environmental damage in the leading, and most, impact categories studied (report in progress).
  
• Green Seal’s GS-33 standard for hotels and lodging properties includes requirements for energy and water conservation and waste reduction to reduce the overall environmental damage from these businesses .
  
• A life cycle assessment study examining a typical restaurant showed the environmental damage of all impacts studied would be reduced by implementing the practices in the GS-46 standard.  Learn more.

third-party certification

We follow these US EPA's requirements for third-party certification:

• Open, transparent standard development process & award criteria
• Criteria based on life cycle (multi-attribute) approach
• Clear consumer communication on nature of certification
• Regular updating of standards/criteria
• Facility inspection/site audit
• Protocols for testing institutions/labs
• Access to certification for companies of all sizes