Articles
Marketing a High Perform A CASE STUDY OF THE PIPPIN-STEARNS GREEN HOME BY Jenny Peppin
Between 2004-2006 I took the courses in the Diploma Series at North Carolina State University, in their Green Building and Renewable Energy Technologies Diploma programs and received both Diploma’s. There was also a program within the NCSU Solar Center, called the ‘NC Healthy Built Homes’, and I became certified in that program, as well. During this same time, the concept of Green Building was just being talked about in our local Homebuilders Association, although no one in our area had built a certified Green Home yet. My husband and I discussed needing a new roof on our home, and some additional living space, as well as, a new Home Office so we could relocate our business to our home, to eliminate the hour commute we had to our office building. Therefore, we decided to add onto our home, using all the info I had learned, and design a ‘Green / High Performance’ transformation of our home. Since this would be the first home of this type in our area, we also chose to promote the project:
36 - AIBD magazine
• • •
as an educational and awareness opportunity for the local community, through the local Homebuilders Association to educate and convert the Builders to building Green and High Performance to promote our Design business as Green / High Performance Design and Building Experts.
At that time, I was also a Licensed Contractor and the CoChair of the Lake Norman Homebuilders Association’s Green Building Council, along with another local Builder. This was a great way to get more of our local Builder members on board with building Green / High Performance (HP) homes. They could see one being built and through the educational opportunities that we would provide to them and the public, we would create more demand from existing homeowners, new home buyers, and realtors, for homes to be built this way. Our first step was putting together our project Team, and then we developed a Marketing Plan and a brand identity for our project. The Team had to be assembled first and the list of Team members included: our CPA and the bank Lender, who both had to be educated on the Green Building / High