Remember this 2009 piece about ‘sustainability’ and Aeron chairs?

One way to go is to make products which have the opposite of built-in obsolescence – products which are engineered not only to work superbly but also to last a long time, and so save resources that way.

But they will tend to be more expensive. Better quality materials and build, more sophisticated engineering.

What I sit on write this blog is an old wooden ‘captain’s chair’ I bought in South Africa years ago. Rather nice looking. An antique of sorts, made from all natural materials, which has lasted for some decades and is still going strong.

Take instead the Aeron chair as made by Herman Miller.

It looks like a cross between a fancy cappuccino machine and something from a Dan Dare spaceship.

But because it is so efficient and elegant, not only does it sell well at its full (and significant) price, a market in second-hand Aeron chairs has appeared…

So as usual you get what you pay for.

But it’s maybe a wise move now and again to invest in something strong and good.

Because in paying that higher price you are capturing not only the costs of the article itself today, but also the longer-term total costs as we (at this stage) can hope to measure them?

An Aeron chair which saves the planet (a bit) is good.

A chair which saves one’s buttocks is even better.

But not very comfortable. Not at all.

One brand new Aeron chair has just arrived chez Crawford and is now adorning my bottom as I type this. It is amazingly comfortable, having adjustable everything. It will last me for the rest of my life.

Hurrah.