By Dara O'Rourke, November 17, 2009 · Posted under GoodGuide Happenings

We’ve now made it even easier to find the products rated by GoodGuide through our new partnership with Alice.com. Alice.com is a young company which has generated a lot of buzz thanks to its innovative way of helping consumers purchase essential household items. We share a common goal of giving consumers the option to make smarter shopping decisions - so both sides jumped at the chance to partner.

When you are shopping on Alice.com, you’ll now see GoodGuide product ratings next to a product, providing you with as much information as possible before purchasing. When you’re researching on GoodGuide, we also provide links to Alice.com so you can buy the products you’re interested in and have them delivered to your home with no shipping costs.

This partnership is another step in our journey to put GoodGuide ratings into the hands of consumers everywhere they are shopping: whether they are on GoodGuide, partner websites, our award-winning iPhone application, or simply browsing the aisles of grocery stores. Our goal is to make sure you can access GoodGuide information wherever and whenever you want so you can choose better products for your family.

Alice.com joins TheFind and a growing number of sites who support GoodGuide’s transparent, science-based ratings system to communicate the health, environmental, and social impacts of products and companies to their users

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By Dara O'Rourke, January 13, 2009 · Posted under GoodGuide Happenings

On Friday night we won a Crunchie award – Silicon Valley’s version of the Oscars. We were voted the Startup “Most Likely to Make the World a Better Place.”

This was an amazing and humbling honor for us. We were nominated for this award alongside some absolutely amazing organizations - Kiva, Akoha, the Causes App for Facebook, Better Place, and CO2Stats.

Standing next to these fantastic organizations made me wonder: Is it really possible for a startup like us to change the world?

Read more...

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By Dara O'Rourke, December 09, 2008 · Posted under GoodGuide Happenings, Health Issues

According to Consumers Union, product recalls due to safety hazards were up 19% this year, with over 29 million children’s products recalled in the last 12 months alone and over 12 million toys recalled due to lead contamination.

A new law passed in August was designed to protect children from hazards in toys by tightening standards for lead and by banning phthalates outright in toys. These chemicals are causes for serious concern: lead is a known childhood developmental toxin, while phthalates have been banned in Europe for almost a decade due to suspected threats to the hormonal system, including risks of boys being born with smaller penises and undescended testicles.

Unfortunately, despite the continued flow of problematic toys into the US, the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) recently issued a legal interpretation of this law effectively delaying its implementation. The CPSC has ruled (in response to industry lobbying) that products manufactured before February 10, 2009, are grandfathered in and not subject to the new safety rules.

This means that toxic toys with phthalates can be sold on US toy store shelves not only this Christmas, but for many years to come. The Wall Street Journal reports that some toy makers are now stockpiling toys with phthalates and may be flooding the market with these products in order to sell off their inventory before the federal ban takes effect.

Particularly troubling for parents is that toy companies do not have to disclose the “ingredients” in their products. It is thus almost impossible to know whether a rubber ducky on the shelves contains lead, phthalates, or other hazards. US shoppers may unknowingly be purchasing unsafe toys during this and many future holiday seasons.

GoodGuide has been working to fill this gap in information by developing a database of safe toys that rates toys for lead, cadmium, mercury, phthalates, environmental performance, treatment of workers, safety recalls, and other issues. We have partnered with HealthyToys.org, the Center for Health and Environmental Justice, Healthy Child Healthy World, and the City of San Francisco, to pull together the best available information for concerned shoppers.

Today, we are releasing our ratings of the safest toys. Visit GoodGuide.com or download the newest update to our iPhone application for all of this data. You will be surprised to see how many products from famous brands still contain hazardous materials. And you will be relieved to know you can still find safe toys while you’re online or out shopping in a store - you just have to know where to look.

Arm yourself with GoodGuide’s information on safe toys, tell your friends, and then have a safe and healthy holiday!

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By Dara O'Rourke, October 17, 2008 · Posted under GoodGuide Happenings

Everyone knows that millions of dollars are flowing into the campaigns of John McCain, Sarah Palin, Barack Obama, and Joe Biden right now. But do you know who the companies you buy products from everyday are supporting with the dollars you give them? And do you know whether companies you support are supporting politicians you would not support?

GoodGuide, in partnership with the Center for Responsive Politics, is releasing company-focused campaign finance data today, showing the political donations of major corporations to Republican and Democratic parties and candidates.

There are some big surprises in this data. Barack Obama supporters may be surprised to learn that Procter & Gamble, the maker of the Tide laundry detergent and Pantene shampoo you bought last week, donates overwhelmingly to Republicans. And Sarah Palin supporters may be surprised to learn that your Estee Lauder lipstick (which we hope you won’t actually try putting on a pitbull) provides revenue to a company that overwhelmingly supports Democratic candidates.

Also interesting is that some prominent consumer products firms such as Unilever have chosen to not contribute to political parties or candidates through PACs or corporate donations. (They do, however, lobby heavily on legislation.) In cases like Unilever, we still show you the donations of their employees. And over time we hope to add in information on corporate lobbying related to environmental, social, and consumer safety regulations.

So, for the first time, you can easily see whether companies you support donate more to Democrats or Republicans. Check out goodguide.com/contributions and Click “Republican” or “Democratic” to see which companies support your political perspective. Or, search GoodGuide for specific products and learn whether a green product is really Red or Blue!

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By Dara O'Rourke, September 19, 2008 · Posted under GoodGuide Happenings

We are incredibly excited to introduce you to the GoodGuide Blog. We have been working away quietly for the last two years – first at the University of California, Berkeley, and most recently in GoodGuide’s world headquarters in downtown San Francisco – building the world’s largest and most reliable source of information on the environmental, social, and health performance of products and companies. The goal of this work is simple: to help you find safe, healthy, and green products.

And this week – finally – we get to show you what we have been building. Last Wednesday, we launched our beta Web site at the TechCrunch50 conference. Check out our presentation:

As you will see, this is a very early beta. But the feedback we have been getting has been amazing. We even won a Jury Award at the conference last week. Read more on our press page.

But does the world really need one more blog? It turns out… yes.

One of the amazing things about the years of research we have been conducting is that we are constantly uncovering surprising facts about products and companies we thought we knew.

This blog will take you beyond our data and ratings, digging into some of the surprising stories we find as we look beneath the label of the products we consume every day. From shampoos to laptops to frying pans to the food we eat, there are a host of surprises. This blog will focus in part on product contents, looking at what is actually inside many common products, what functions those ingredients play, what risks they pose, and what alternatives there are to these chemicals.

We also want to dig into production networks: who actually makes the products we are buying? What corporation owns the brand you thought you knew? What are their policies and practices? And what were the impacts of making the product on the environment? On workers? On our health?

We will also provide quick summaries and commentary on breaking news stories and recent scientific studies. As news stories emerge about lead paint on kids’ toys, toxic chemicals in toothpastes, health impacts of baby shampoos, or sweatshop scandals in clothing and electronics firms, we want to help put them in context. And as always, we will be working to help you find safer, healthier, and greener products.

We also want to hear from you. We would love for you to participate in this conversation. Leave us comments. Ask questions. Disagree with us.

But most importantly, look beneath the label, and then Find What’s Good For You!

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