So Easy Being Green

We were really lucky when we bought our home 3 and a half years ago.  The lady that previously lived here had upgraded a lot of her light bulbs to energy efficient ones.  A few were the “Instant On” bulbs, but most were the light bulbs that took a bit to fully shine.  I didn’t like those so I actually took them out and replaced them with regular, cheap bulbs.  Well, those regular, cheap bulbs kept blowing on me – so I put the energy efficient ones back in {I kept them just in case}!

I hadn’t really thought about it – because I don’t have to buy light bulbs that often – but we’ve never changed any of those bulbs!  They’re going strong at almost 4 years!  So, I decided that it was time to make a change and make all of our light bulbs turn green!

Before the switch, anytime I bought light bulbs, I always bought the GE Reveal.  I liked the crisper light and didn’t mind to pay a bit more for those bulbs.  I had it in my mind, and my husband especially had it in his mind, that it would cost a fortune to replace all of the light bulbs in our house to the GE Energy Smart bulbs.  It might have a few years ago, but it seems that these Energy Smart bulbs have really dropped in price and are extremely affordable – especially when you factor in how long they last AND how much money they’ll save you on your energy bill!

I went around the house checking out all of the light bulbs that I would need to switch over.  I was so happy to discover that only about 1/2 of the light fixtures around the inside AND outside of our house were already Energy Smart bulbs!  I was 1/2 to having all green light bulbs already!  I headed to our local Walmart with my list and a small bag of a couple of light bulbs that weren’t standard size to get what I needed!

Honestly, I was quite overwhelmed when I got to the lighting aisles.  I would really recommend doing a bit of research before you go to the store.  You can check out GELighting.com, which is a great resource that I found after I shopped.  I thought because I had bought Energy Smart bulbs once before, I would easily know what I wanted.  But I think there are a lot more Energy Efficient choices on the market today.

One thing you’ll definitely notice as you’re shopping for green-er bulbs is the price.  It’s definitely dropped over the past few years and you’ll reap more monetary rewards by buying in bulk.  GE wants you to save money on your energy bill AND help the environment… I feel like it’s an encouragement to do a makeover on your light bulbs!  Not only will you see great money savings by buying bulbs in larger packages, but you can also save another $2.00 with this coupon on your GE Energy Smart Purchase at Walmart!

I spent around $130 to switch out the remaining outdated bulbs to GE Energy Smart light bulbs!  I was very happy with that cost and am really excited to see the change in our energy bill.  I’ll have to wait a couple of months to actually see that, but there’s a fun calculator on the GE Lighting website that will estimate your energy savings.  I put in my information and… I’m estimated to save $162.35 annually and $889.60 savings over the life of the bulbs!!!

In addition to switching your light bulbs to more energy efficient ones like the GE Energy Smart bulbs, you can also do little things to help the environment {and your energy bill} like:

• Turn off your lights when they’re not really necessary.
• Get motion lights for outside so your lights aren’t on continuously.
• Use timers if you like lights on before you go to bed – the timers will turn them off and you won’t even know it!

I am so excited that all of our light bulbs are green now – and I can’t wait to start seeing more green in our bank account, thanks to lower energy bills!  I’ll be posting again in a month, letting you know if we did see a change in our energy bill or not.  In the meantime, be sure to check out GE on Facebook and Twitter if you’re interested in making your light bulbs green too!

You can see more pictures of my shopping experience with GE Energy Smart Bulbs and more in my Google+ Album!

I am a member of the Collective Bias™ Social Fabric® Community.  This shop has been compensated as part of a social shopper insights study for Collective Bias™. #CBias #SocialFabric