Adrian Grenier Talks Sustainability, Says It’s Not About ‘Being Green’

Adrian Grenier doesn’t necessarily want to force you to drive a Prius or eat organic foods, but he does want you be aware that there is a healthier way to live.

Grenier, along with SHFT.com co-founder Peter Glatzer and environmental engineer Barry A. Cik, participated in an intimate discussion on the sustainable marketplace at Wondros in Los Angeles on Thursday night .

The pair’s multimedia platform SHFT.com sells sustainably-designed products and provides online content on the sustainable marketplace. After starting their own SHFT house wine, Grenier and Glatzer hope to place the label on items of their own. “We’re forming our partnerships, and we aim in the future to start to create products and support products that basically have our endorsement,” Grenier told The Hollywood Reporter.

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Sponsored by THR, the event marked the launch of the environmental salon series hosted by the Environmental Media Association, the Burkle Global Impact Initiative and the United Nations Foundation. Grenier, Glatzer and Cik participated in a Q&A session where many guests were shocked to learn that there are 84,000 chemicals present among the various food, home products and building spaces used on an everyday basis.

Grenier and Glatzer showed a clip from their The Big SHFT series featuring Pharrell and Bionic Yarn’s collaboration (Bionic Yarn makes fabrics from the fibers of recycled plastic) to show that almost everything can be made in a more healthy and environmentally-friendly way.

“It’s not about green,” Grenier told THR. “It’s not about saving the environment or saving the world. For me it’s about increasing your awareness and your appreciation for the things that improve your quality of life. Toxically-made products, unhealthy foods, things that generally are bad for the environment are also detrimental to your own health and your own quality of life.”

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Grenier, who was raised by his mother to live a healthy lifestyle, understands reading labels and processing the outpour of information from various outlets can be overwhelming for those who may just now be introducing themselves to an eco-conscious way of living. He advises that the decisions you make in what products you use should be personal as long as it keeps you excited to be healthy.

“Find the things that inspire you and the products that are going to enrich your health and well being and I think that’s a good rule of thumb,” said Grenier. “There’s not one mold that fits all because there’s diverse lifestyles and experiences.”

“People really want to learn about sustainable products and how they can change their shopping habits and how they have choices in what to buy and how shopping dollars can really affect what they’re purchasing power can do with large companies,” said EMA President Debbie Levin on launching the series. “That can shift the needle about what companies are producing.”