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Chris Kious, PJ Doran, Aaron Gogolin, Ezra Taxel
A Piece of Cleveland

The Nominator: Lillian Kuri, Cleveland Foundation

How has the nominee implemented sustainable business practices in his or her business or organization?
A Piece of Cleveland uses deconstructed material to create new products (furniture , installations, retail items) Chris Kious is exploring taking decostruction to scale (100+ homes per year) -creating jobs and helping with the forclosure crisis. They are all helping to great a reuse industry in Cleveland.

What are the triple bottom line benefits (people, planet, prosperity) of the nominee`s work?
The deconstruction and reuse clearly is about the planet. The creation of jobs for underenployed indivudals in deconstruction is truly about social mission and a piece of cleveland is clearly positioned to do very well in the marketplace. There is a growing demand for products made from deconstructed material.

How has the nominee inspired you to implement sustainable business practices?
Their work is so inspiring that I have commissioned them to build items and integrate them into my new home. Also, the Cleveland Foundation is working with this team to position Cleveland and the place for all thing reuse - deconstruction to scale, an entrepeurial industry creating new materials, new land reutilization for the cleared/ vacant land and intellectual property coming from cleveland on the design of new tools for deconstruction.

How can someone else translate the success of the nominee? Is the work of the nominee an example or model that others can follow?
This work is an example. They will be responsible for a whole network of businesses that grow from this new industry.

How does the nominee actively participate in the sustainability community? How do they collaborate and share their knowledge with others?
They are leaders, collaborators, risk takers and truly commited to Cleveland. They are active not just in the sutainablilty community but helping to educate those that are not actively engaged.