Fuel Efficiency Blog
It all began with one simple action: knocking on the door of Ottawa’s Cindy Goyette (pictured here, left). The One Change team came across Cindy’s home while delivering free digital tire gauges throughout the city as part of our fuel efficiency campaign, which is sponsored by Canadian Tire.
Little did we know that when we handed a tire gauge to Cindy, we weren’t opening the door to just one person; we were opening the door to thousands of people across Canada. Cindy isn’t your average Ottawa resident. She’s a devoted environmentalist and enthusiastic volunteer. She’s also Property Manager for GWL Realty Advisors, one of the leading real estate investment advisors in the country.
“What started with a single digital tire gauge being dropped off at my home… resulted in GWL Realty Advisors making contact with One Change to see what we could do to assist with this campaign,” says Cindy. “GWL Realty Advisors is very serious in our commitment to the environment. This was an excellent opportunity for us to partner with a community-based organization to get the message out to our building occupants.”
On November 2 and 3, Cindy helped organize a massive tire gauge blitz at GWL Realty Advisors’ Ottawa offices. Thanks to her involvement, we were able to engage more than 1,200 people in conversations about fuel efficiency while providing them with a free digital tire gauge, all in only four hours. Cindy was thrilled to report that GWL Realty Advisors’ employees were very receptive to the message that simple actions matter. “Our employees made it a challenge to outdo the other building participating in the campaign,” she says.
In fact, the blitz went over so well in Ottawa that Cindy is in the process of organizing similar events in the company’s Toronto offices. “When we partnered with One Change in Ottawa, we realized the benefits of this campaign and how easy it was for us to provide a venue to get the message out to our tenants,” she says. “We naturally wanted to share this information with our Toronto properties… (At GWL Realty Advisors), we monitor our energy consumption across the country and continue to look for ways to reduce our carbon footprint. Our policies include green purchasing, energy conservation, waste management programs, tenant awareness, and participation in programs such as One Change.”
Cindy plans to knock on as many doors as she can in her efforts to empower people with the knowledge that they can make smart choices to protect the environment. She’s doing it the best way she knows—one door at a time, one employee at a time, one tire gauge at a time.
