This year, I’ll be hosting a panel titled “Women Get Green & Clean.” The panel will feature Emmy Berlind, Brand Manager for Clorox’ highly successful Green Works eco-friendly cleaning products. I’ll eventually share what I learn here. But if you want to get the info straight from the source, I invite you to join me in Chicago.

“Even if today’s woman appears to be relaxing in front of a late-night television show, reading a magazine in the pediatrician’s office, or tackling a complicated analystical study at work, she is probably also thinking about and preparing for the other dimensions of her life. Perhaps she is weighing the benfits of her 401(k) plan, plotting out her organic vegetable garden, ticking off birthday party logistics, and longing for a neck massage.”

Sound familiar? It should. Notes Kelley, a partner/director of Ketchum Communications’ Global Brand Marketing Practice, “More businesses are being started by women and more households are being headed by single women than ever before.” 

We’ve always been busy. But these days, given our increasing responsibilities at work as well as at home, we’re feeling a new time crunch, especially when it comes to shopping for goods and services. We need accessible information, reliable brands, and positive results for every dollar we spend. We also need to spend less time shopping to get better quality than ever before.

Why is it worth meeting women where they are? Says Kelley, “It’s no secret that women spend more than three trillion dollars a year on goods and services. What is relatively new is that women are now making key purchasing decisions for large B2B contracts. Translated, we may be choosing laundry detergent at night, but during the day we are deciding between a $30-million server farm from Dell or IBM.”

In all, women are spending $.85 of every consumer dollar. We’re not a niche market. We ARE the market. Big Green Breakthrough has gotten that message loud and clear – which is why we’re so focused on coaching women business owners to use their marketplace clout to protect the environment.  Any company that wants its own business to succeed should follow suit.