Green Guide Goes Online: Help Fund Hungarys Online Green Compass!

Green Guide Goes Online: Help Fund Hungary's Online Green Compass!

Find the nearest veggie restaurant, zero waste shop, farmer’s market or eco-friendly hairdresser with Hungary’s complex online green compass, brought to you by the team behind the successful Green Guide Budapest map. The first steps are powered by energy supplier E.ON’s significant financial support, and we are now turning to the community for support to fund the rest of the costs and make our dream a reality.

It All Started with a Map

The project began back in 2019, when we, three Budapestians decided to create a freely available, printed informational publication of the capital that can aid locals and visitors to eat, relax, travel and shop in a more conscious and sustainable way. Also with the help of crowdfunding, we published a bilingual map that unites various green topics: venues and events that prioritise sustainability, a healthy lifestyle and waste reduction. The map received overwhelming positive feedback, and even gained international recognition through features in the British National Geographic, as well as Monocle Magazine.

We realised that, while sustainable options are now abundant, without the right information, city dwellers can have a hard time reforming their lifestyle and finding Earth-friendly alternatives. Locals struggle with this too - let alone first time visitors or expats who have limited access to information due to the language barrier and lack of English-language articles within this topic.

Next Step: an Online Platform

Our newest endeavour is to take all the research and information we’ve gathered in the past few years, and turn it into a complex platform with the aim of connecting eco-conscious citizens with sustainable businesses.

The mobile-friendly website, due for release in Autumn 2021, will consist of a map of sustainable businesses and brands in sectors ranging from food and drinks, groceries, shopping, personal services, community gardens and other green areas in Budapest and beyond, as well as a green events calendar. English language articles will also be featured on the currently Hungarian blog, full of useful, bite-sized tips and sweet illustrations on Earth-friendly living.

What Makes a Business Green, Anyway?

Sustainability isn’t black or white; it’s a huge (green, if anything) spectrum embodying not only environmental, but social and economical responsibility as well. Our team aims to shed a light on all three with a custom sustainability index we developed in order to assess businesses’ impact in the fields of energy and water consumption, material use, waste management, transportation, and social contribution. The brands featured on the website will have passed this assessment, meaning that you can safely choose your next go-to café or slow fashion brand from their map, knowing that your buck will be well spent, supporting responsible businesses. After the challenges small businesses had to face in the past year, they really could use this support, too.

Armed with the knowledge of best practices in various industries, we also offer ‘green coaching’ and advice to companies striving to make more sustainable choices in their business.

The Power of Community

“Fifty people, if united, can achieve more than five hundred individually,” is a quote by Yuval Noah Harari we often refer to. It is our mission to help build a community of those passionate about conscious living and making a positive impact in the world, providing motivation and support to one another. We’re all in this together - climate change, that is - so it only makes sense that we work together in order to shift people’s and businesses’ mentality, and move towards a greener future instead of returning to the old, destructive patterns.

To turn the vision of this website into reality, a total of 10 million Forints (33.000 USD) are needed to cover the expenses of research, design and development of the complex website. Luckily, the first few million Forints are covered, thanks to a sponsorship by E.ON, an international energy supplier with a focus on investing into renewable energy and supporting local causes. To raise the remaining amount of 5 million Forints, we are asking our followers to support the cause through this crowdfunding campaign, running until the end of July.

This is How You Can Help Make it Happen

You can donate as little as 5 dollars in the crowdfunding campaign to later be featured on the Donors’ Wall of Fame on the website, but the bigger the contribution, the more ‘perks’ you get: these thank-you gifts include custom designed prints, witty, embroidered badges, and VIP invites to the platform’s launch party. You can even set a custom Facebook profile picture frame if you’d like to show your support.

But even if you can’t contribute to the project financially, there are many ways to help: every social media share, like, and follow brings us closer to achieving our goal, eventually making our favourite Hungarian cities greener, better places to live, work and play. Share the campaign with your friends, and use the hashtag #GreenGuideGoesOnline to be part of the movement!

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