Mokugift Partners with the United Nations Environment Programme in the Goal of Planting 7 Billion Trees Worldwide

Today we announced our participation in the Billion Tree Campaign. Here is our press release:

SAN FRANCISCO — December 16, 2008 — Mokugift, the online tree gifting service that allows people to plant a real tree, today announced a partnership with the United Nations Environment Programme’s Billion Tree Campaign. The initiative, launched in 2006 by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), is calling on citizens globally to plant seven billion trees, roughly one tree per person, by the end of 2009. In support of the Billion Tree Campaign, mokugift pledges to plant five million trees by the end of 2009.
Under the Plant for the Planet: Billion Tree Campaign, individuals, communities, private sector companies, organizations and governments in 164 countries planted over two billion trees during the first 18 months of the campaign. The Billion Tree Campaign supports global environmental solidarity and helps fight one of the most critical challenges of our time – global warming. Mokugift allows those who wish to join this global campaign to plant trees with a simple click of a mouse.

"We are honored to partner with mokugift as part of the UNEP Billion Tree Campaign. Mokugift is taking creative approaches with its online gifting service and iPhone application to help the Billion Tree Campaign achieve a target of seven billion trees. In the spirit of the Billion Tree Campaign, mokugift empowers ordinary people to be part of the solution," said Satinder Binda, Director, UNEP.

As simple as sending an e-card, mokugift allows anyone to plant trees and fight global warming without the need to lift a shovel. Trees are priced at $1/tree and the gifter can select which country the trees are to be planted in. Mokugift trees are planted by award-winning agroforestry partners in 12 tropical countries where tree-planting is most beneficial to the fight against global warming. Partner agroforestry projects focus on enriching the land and creating sustainable lifestyle for local communities.

About United Nations Environment Programme
The Billion Tree Campaign was launched in November 2006 by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). It is now recognized as one of the UN’s most successful environmental campaigns reaching several billion people across 166 countries. In twenty three months, people from around the world have pledged to plant 4.2 billion trees. UNEP’s records confirm a staggering 2.5 billion trees have already been planted. Ethiopia has planted over 700 million trees, with a survival rate of 70 per cent. In 2008, Ethiopia is planning to plant another one billion trees. The campaign has exceeded all expectations because of strong grassroots support and well planned global outreach strategies. “Plant for the Planet: The Billion Tree Campaign” stresses the power of partnerships. In its second stage, the campaign plans to plant seven billion trees -- one tree for every living person on the planet. Every tree counts and UNEP counts every tree.

For more information, please visit: http://www.unep.org/billiontreecampaign/


About mokugift
Mokugift enables consumers and organizations to plant trees with a simple click of a mouse for $1/tree. Mokugift, a supporter of the United Nations Environment Programme's Billion Tree Campaign, partners with award-winning agroforestry organizations such as Trees For The Future and Sustainable Harvest International to plant trees in twelve tropical countries fighting deforestation and poverty: Belize, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama, Cameroon, Ethiopia, Burundi, Senegal, Zambia, India, Philippines, and Haiti. Giving a tree is similar to sending an e-card, and recipients can proudly display their trees online at Facebook, MySpace, iGoogle and other popular Web sites. Mokugift enables iPhone and iPod touch owners to plant a tree as easily as they can buy their favorite song. Mokugift plants a tree when iPhone and iPod touch owners purchase 'A Real Tree' application on Apple's iTunes AppStore.
For more information, please visit: http://www.mokugift.com

mokugift quote of the week

A seed hidden in the heart of an apple is an orchard invisible. ~ Welsh Proverb

Richard Preston: Climbing the world's biggest trees

This is a must see. Richard Preston gives a presentation about climbing Redwoods. He gives you a sense of being there. Just enough that you want to climb one to complete the experience he started for you.

The presentation was given in Feb 2008 and posted this month. Kishore Balakrishnan thoughtfully suggested this video to us. Thanks for the inspiration Kishore.

Environmental blogs

A few more news sources have started to pick up news about our 'A Real Tree' iPhone app!
Check out Climate Change Today . The blog is written by Christopher R. Reeves who is an environmental attorney with the Atlanta office of the Finley Firm, P.C. Mr. Reeves’ practice includes environmental and mass tort litigation.

Forest News Watch, a forestry industry newsletter also picked up our story.

Check out their sites, there is some nicely selected content on there.

Plant a Tree on your iPhone or iPod touch

We are proud to announce that you can plant a tree on iPhone and iPod touch with mokugift's 'A Real Tree' app, available on iTunes AppStore. Our 'A Real Tree' app makes tree-planting as easy as buying your favorite song. With the click of a button, iPhone or iPod touch owners can buy 'A Real Tree' , trees are then planted by partners, who are award-winning tree-planting organizations in 12 countries fighting deforestation and poverty. 'A Real Tree' is priced at $0.99 (in the US).

iPhone Savior, an iPhone news blog, called us up for a quick interview. Check out iPhone Savior's review here. His screenshots are put together better than ours!

On the iTunes AppStore we have 3 reviews! Please check it out.
So far 94 trees have been planted since our silent launch. Today is our first approach to bloggers and mainstream media.

Eco-Friendly and Green Gifts by Cool Moms Rule!

Mokugift was just featured on Cool Moms Rule! blog, a proud member of the blogher network. Vivien Bruss described mokugift even better than we could. Check out the Eco-Friendly and Green Gifts Ideas post on her blog.

The diversity of ideas and the level of creativity of the different companies is inspiring. Mokugift trees can be a good complement to the products in the guide.

Ecofabulous Gift Guide

Ecofabulous was kind enough to include us in their holiday gift guide. The gift guide is quite extensive. It covers everything from gifts for rock stars to gifts for couch potatoes and everything between those extremes. After reading this post you won't have any excuse not to give a green gift.

Check out the EcoFabulous Holiday Gift Guide 2008 Issue.

Great reviews about mokugift

We recently launched a 'frog' on BzzAgent's FrogPond service. It is a service that brings interesting sites in front of very social people that like to express their thoughts and feedback about products and services. We have noticed that some of the people on BzzAgent FrogPond are very articulate and thoughtful. We have received a very warm welcome on FrogPond and we have received some very tangible and actionable feedback. You see those changes in a few weeks.



Chaos Chronicles planted a tree in memory of her mother. We are honored that our service was chosen to help her celebrate the life of her mother.



Natasha on Soothie Ranch also wrote a great review about mokugift.



We try to keep up on all the blogs and twitters that cover mokugift. If we happened to miss you, we appologise. Please feel drop us a comment and we will check out your blog.

our new office!

We just moved to a new office in Millbrae, California. The move was only about a 1.5 miles (2.4km). The best part is that we are right across the road from the subway station (Millbrae Bay Area Rapid Transit station). I signed up for an EZ-Rider subway card that tops up automatically. It is so convenient. If you are in London or Tokyo it is like the Oyster and Suica cards.

If you are in the neighborhood, feel free to stop by and introduce yourself. We are at 10 Rollins Road - Suite 212A, Millbrae, California 94030

Vote for mokugift!

Open Web Awards is the only multilingual international online voting competition that covers major innovations in web technology. Through an online nominating and voting process, the Open Web Awards recognizes and honors the top achievements in 26 categories.

Make mokugift a Open Web Award winner. More publicity for mokugift means that more people will help our planet! THANKS!

Submit your email in the box below to vote for mokugift:

mokugift mentioned on TMCNet

Stefani Viscusi on the Green Technology blog over at TMCNet mentioned mokugift's rewards programs. TMCNet is the world's argest telecom and technology community. This has been a great way for us to reach out to phone companies. Phone companies send out paper bills that cost over $1 each in postage, labor and paper. They could easily use mokugift to reward consumers for choosing paperless billing. In an economic downturn, it is creative approaches like these that will help companies and the environment.

We started mokugift to show that acheiving business goals be given equal priority to helping the environment.

mokugift on BzzAgent frogpond

We have been so busy with our head down into our work that we forgot to blog about what we are up to.

Today we launched a 'frogpond' on BzzAgent. BzzAgent is an online community that describes itself as:
'Basically, you and your opinions build the Frogpond while you explore new things online and get to recommend them to friends and the rest of the world.'

A very astute member pointed out that we haven't blogged since August. Our bad.

Check out mokugift on frogpond here

branding and the environment

If you've been watching our mokugift rewards page you will see that Branding Strategy Insider is new on our 'As Seen On' section. Branding Strategy Insider helps marketing oriented leaders and professionals build strong brands. They walk the talk. Brad, their Chief Brand Strategist, is on to his second Prius. Thanks to Derrick for linking to us from their blog, a AdAge Power 150 blog. It is a great read to get you thinking about your brand on a daily basis from new angles every day.

Powerfeedback

We are excited to announce that Powerfeedback is now offering mokugift rewards as an option to market research customers. Scott, Powerfeedback's CEO, announced on his tumblr blog this a few days ago.

Scott has a ton of creative ideas and enthusiasm. Our brains are still processing some of the ideas.

image: from flickr by Gaetan Lee
creative commons

mokugift rewards program

Today we launched the mokugift rewards program. It is an incentives service for businesses that want to give customers a meaningful and effective reward.

According to Performics, 83% of Americans would choose products and services with environmental benefits over non-environmental alternatives.

According to the Natural Marketing Institute, 85% of Americans care about the environment. Mokugift rewards was designed to give businesses to reach more than just extremely 'green' segments. Commonly overlooked segments include the Conventionals and the Drifters. NMI defines these segments as:

• DRIFTERS (25% of US population)—while their intentions may be good, DRIFTERS follow trends when it’s easy and affordable. They are currently quite engaged in green purchasing behaviors.
• CONVENTIONALS (19% of US population)—pragmatists who embrace LOHAS behavior when they believe they can make a difference, but are primarily focused on being very careful with their resources and doing the “right” thing because it will save them money.

Explore mokugift rewards for your business.

Recycle Bank pays you to recycle

RecycleBank rewards consumers for recycling. Consumers get points and can redeem those points for coupons and discounts. They help municipalities reduce their garbage dump costs while also helping the environment. It is a win-win concept.

We have partnered with RecycleBank to offer a 2 for 1 coupon for mokugift trees.

We Love NBC's Green Is Universal

We are pleased to announce that we have partnered with NBC's Green Is Universal initiative. You may have seen the Green Is Universal logo while watching your favorite NBC shows. We highly recommend checking it out. The site offers high-quality environmental blog content, resources and a message board.

You can find mokugift on their site in the 'Good Green Fun' section.