ABSTRACT
There are many opinions about green building marketing and most firms find out what works for them only through experience with various approaches. Craig Park is Chief Marketing Officer for Leo A Daly, an Omaha, Nebraska based architecture and engineering (A/E) firm. Consistently ranked among the top 10 largest A/E firms and the top 10 interior design firms, today Leo A Daly has 1,200 professionals in 22 offices in 16 cities worldwide. 1 Based on 2005 revenues, Leo A Daly was ranked ninth among A/E firms nationally. 2 Park said of his firm’s efforts:
Sustainable design is incorporated into our long-range corporate strategic plan so every office – both our architecture and engineering offices – has a commitment to the “2010 Imperative” and the “2030 Challenge,” which are the two mandates to reduce the impacts of buildings on the environment.
Twenty-five percent of our technical staff is LEED accredited, and we have LEED accreditation study groups and testing going on throughout the firm to get that to at least 50% within the next few years. Whenever we go to collegiate recruitment fairs, it seems that sustainability is a mandate for the new generation of young architects and engineers.
We also have a corporate director of sustainable design. He coordinates a forum of similarly-minded architects and engineers, throughout our organization who advise on many of our projects. As we began formally promoting the firm’s history and approach to green buildings, he stepped forward. He said that cared strongly about this in the community and in his work and that he wanted to lead the firm’s effort in developing sustainable ideas and solutions for our clients. So we created the role of sustainability director. We think that sets an example for the rest of the firm and for our clients [about our priorities]. 3
