How do businesses sign up?
Sign up is simple. Just fill out the registration form here. Once you sign up we will send you an email confirming your participation and outlining the next steps.
What's the business commitment?
When a business joins this community-wide program we ask that you commit to:
- Designating a contact person—someone we keep informed about the program. (This could be someone in sustainability, HR or administration.)
- Watching a short webinar that explains how the program works. (The webinar is less than 30 minutes and you can watch at your convenience.)
- Encouraging your employees to participate in Cool Choices. (We’ll provide email and poster templates you can use so that this is easy to do.)
- Joining the fun—celebrating the accomplishments of your employees during the program and at the end when we share back results with you. (How you do this is entirely up to you.)
What's Cool Choices' commitment?
Cool Choices will:
- Facilitate your success by providing a webinar, recruitment templates and outstanding customer service—so that you’ve got what you need to engage your team.
- Make it easy for your employees to participate—by offering an intuitive software platform that participants can access via computers, tablets or smart phones. Plus, once folks sign up we handle all communications with them—making it easy for you.
- Distribute prizes to participants throughout the program as a way to celebrate accomplishments and encourage even more participation.
- Celebrate the accomplishments of businesses and individuals across the New North—positive reinforcement is the best way to accelerate action so we’re constantly sharing good news.
- Deliver business-specific insights—at the end of the program we’ll provide each participating business with a confidential report detailing the activities of their participants as well as the aggregate results across the region. We’ll also share aggregate results with New North. We won’t ever share your business-specific results with anyone else.
What are the IT requirements for business participation?
Our platform is web-based so there’s no need to install software locally. Participants can access the platform via any internet-connected computer, tablet or smart phone.
How long will the program run?
We’ll work with businesses to sign up individuals from September 17th to 28th and then launch the program on October 1. The program will run for six weeks, ending on November 9th.
What's Cool Choices' privacy policy?
When an individual signs up to play Cool Choices they agree to terms of use, similar to other software platforms. In those terms we explain that our purpose is to promote sustainable practices and that while we share aggregate results from our programs (e.g., “200 people started carpooling to work”), we never share personally-identifying information (e.g., “Mary Smith carpooled to work”). We don’t collect any financial information from participants—just a name, email and address (so that we can mail prizes).
Relative to participating businesses, each business will have exclusive access to specifics about what their employees did as part of the program. We’ll share only the aggregate results with other parties, including the McKnight Foundation.
Our aim is to celebrate all the good stuff happening across the region so that people adopt yet more sustainable practices. Be assured that if we think there’s a story specific to your business worth sharing a) we’ll get your permission and b) it’ll be the kind of story that every other business wishes we were telling about them!
How much time does it take to play Cool Choices?
Most participants spend less than two minutes a day in the Cool Choices platform. Users will simply log in, play a card, and earn points for their team.
Do players need to be skilled at using computers to play Cool Choices?
Playing Cool Choices is easy and intuitive. There’s no tech-savvy or special training required. When you log in for the first time, a brief tutorial highlights the game’s features. Daily emails include a quick link to log into the game.
Can Cool Choices be played on a tablet or mobile phone?
Yes, Cool Choices is designed for any device you may be using. Playing Cool Choices is fun, simple, and easy from a mobile phone, tablet, and/or personal computer.
Is the Cool Choices platform available in languages other than English?
Yes! Cool Choices is available in Spanish. You can choose this language option during registration and from the Settings menu.
Does each individual have a log-in and who tracks all of that?
When players sign up they create a log-in ID and password. Our system can remember them on their devices so that they don’t have to log in each time and of course we can help participants recover passwords when necessary.
How will we know which of our employees are participating?
When an individual signs up for this program we’ll ask them to identify their employer using a list of all the businesses that signed up to participate. And then we’ll use that information to give you real-time data on everyone who’s participating from your business. (Accessing this data is one of the topics we’ll cover in the webinar we mentioned above.)
If this is free, who's funding the program?
The NE Wisconsin program is funded by the McKnight Foundation. This program is part of a bigger effort to support sustainability efforts across Wisconsin. (We implemented a similar program last year with businesses in Waukesha County—you can learn more about that here.) In addition we’re receiving donated prizes and sponsorships from local sources (if you’re interested in supporting our efforts email Kathy Kuntz at kkuntz@coolchoices.com).
Who can I contact if I've got other questions?
Email your questions to Kathy Kuntz at kkuntz@coolchoices.com
