Happy Eco News is Five!

By Grant Brown, Founder, Happy Eco News

As 2023 begins, I want to thank you for supporting Happy Eco News over the last five years. 

Five years. Long enough that it seems I have always done this but short enough that it still feels new and fun. Maybe that is how it is supposed to feel when you love what you do. 

In 2023 Happy Eco News will pass 10,000 posts, all news about the environment and all good news. We are here for two reasons: 1) to show people there are reasons for hope and that they, too, can take action, and 2) to help people already taking action by providing them with a platform to reach more people.

I am not immune to the bad news; it is everywhere. However, the most important thing I have learned from this project is that the easiest antidote to eco-anxiety (and maintaining a healthy perspective) is to take action. It doesn’t have to be anything huge. As the saying goes, a journey of 1000 miles begins with a single step. For me, this first step was trying to counteract the negative stories with a feed of positive ones. For many others, it is reading Happy Eco News each day.

The first news story on Happy Eco News was posted on January 1, 2018, and was called “12 positive environmental stories from the past 12 months”. Appropriate and fitting but totally coincidental. The original story is now gone, likely a casualty of content management for their website, but the site where the story was published still exists and is called BirdLife International. They are some of the good people doing good things that I want to help. If you can afford it in these difficult times, their cause, like so many others, is a good one to support.

Now, after five years and thousands of news stories, it’s time to begin the next chapter in the evolution of Happy Eco News. While I do not believe in an eternal growth mindset or growth for growth’s sake, I want to reach and help as many people and projects as possible. Currently, we gain a small number of viewers each month, but we are nowhere near our potential.

Four things are new for 2023: 1) rebranding, 2) a new website and 3) all-new, original content, and 4) advertising.

• Branding: Happy Eco News will get a new logo and brand strategy to help differentiate us from all the other brands that use a similar happy face globe logo. 
• Website: HappyEcoNews.com will get a brand new, custom-designed website that will provide a better user experience and organized content.
• Content: Happy Eco News will transition to all original content over the next year. We will continue to provide the news you know and love, but we will expand the roster and will have more original stories written for us.
• Advertising: Happy Eco News needs money to operate. I want to reach more people and help those who need support. This takes money. HEN will soon be running tastefully curated ad content about companies that align with our values. We will be careful to maintain integrity and transparency during this process. 

2023 will be a year of change for Happy Eco News, and while change and the unknown are sometimes scary, they can also be a fun adventure. I am proud to say we aren’t going anywhere, just getting better with the intent to help more people and, ultimately, encourage them to take action. No matter how small or insignificant your first actions seem, do something. Start somewhere. Learn how good it feels to be a part of the solution, and take the first step in your own eco-journey.