I just bought a new Herman Miller Mirra chair and couldn’t be happier. Not only did I get an exceptionally good office chair, I also supported a company that doesn’t dismiss the Cradle to Cradle paradigm as utopia but takes takes the full advantage of it, right now:

• Customers get a superb product that lasts forever, comes with a 12-year guarantee, is one of the most ergonomic chairs in the market, is void of harmful substances and emits basically nothing.
• After its natural life, Mirra is up to 96% recyclable (and made of 42% recycled materials to begin with), putting a considerably lesser burden on the environment than a normal chair.
• The employees of Herman Miller work in conditions like the GreenHouse in Holland, Michigan, with fresh air and natural light for everyone, a site that does very little harm to the natural habitat and that is named a Michigan Clean Corporate Citizen. No wonder that, according to Wikipedia:

Herman Miller is consistently recognized as one of Fortune Magazine’s “Most Admired Companies”, having placed at the top of the list for Furniture companies for the past 18 consecutive years.

Read the full story from my weblog.

Herman Miller seems to me to be a pioneering example of the fact that doing the right thing and doing good business are things that support each other, not mutually exclusive.