Work record / Stories

Nobody was really buying green

My first Tellus client taught me what people were actually paying for.

My first client at Tellus cared, more than anyone I had met, about what she would breathe and touch inside her own house. I had constructed the company's identity around green building and the environmental pitch, since that was the story I thought I was selling.

She taught me something else. Carbon meant nothing to her. The air and surfaces of her daily life were what counted. Nearly every client after her followed the same pattern. They paid first for their own health, then for their money, and for the planet a distant third, whatever our marketing claimed.

Here is the blunt version, because it is accurate and most builders of that era still avoid admitting it: nobody was really buying green. The brand stayed built on sustainability since that worked for us, yet I never allowed myself to think it was why anyone signed.

Story details

All stories · Work record