Colette Brooks is Chief Imagination Officer of Big Imagination Group (BIG) – a Culver City based branding and communications firm with a focus on culture-building, conscious consumerism, and socially and environmentally responsible marketing. As a strategist and big idea person, Brooks is also the founder of Biobling, an online resource that connects conscious people with biodiesel cars and the fuel to run them, as well as co-founder of the Los Angeles Biodiesel Co-op. She is also co-creator of Greenopia, the urban dwellers guide to green living.

When gas prices skyrocketed in 2001 and the nation was looking for affordable fuel solutions, it was Brooks who convinced a handful of celebrities to shun gas-guzzling limos at the Academy Awards in favor of chauffeur-driven Toyota Priuses. That was the tipping point for hybrid technology as Brooks transformed the Toyota Prius into the Hollywood “it” car, and as a result, created the unprecedented demand by the general public. By 2006 she had garnered more than 100 celebrity riders for the clean air cause and entrenched her firm at the forefront of green marketing.

In 2004 Brooks’ started BioBling, a dream that allowed her to fuse her long-standing infatuation with vintage muscle cars and her passion for the environment. In response to the gas shorted of the 70’s and 80’s, domestic automakers produced diesel versions of their popular V8 counterparts. Brooks began to collect “pimped-off-the-assembly line” diesel vehicles that she fueled with soy, walnut or any other renewable, agriculturally grown feedstock, setting an example for others who wanted to kick the petrol habit in style.

In an effort to cultivate an alternative fuel infrastructure, in 2005 Brooks co-founded the Los Angeles Biodiesel Co-op, offering members affordable and convenient access to B100 fuel through a portable filling station housed in a trailer. By demonstrating market demand, the co-op served as the catalyst to make biodiesel available at the pump in two west Los Angeles gas stations. She is currently in partnership with Culver City to develop the first alternative fuel center in Los Angeles – complete with biodiesel and ethanol pumps, an electric charging station, an organic mini-mart and a community education center that promotes green living.

Colette’s commitment to the environment transcends all aspects of her life. She has recently undergone a green transformation of her 1947 Malibu ranch house. Solar hot water and electricity, all renewable and nontoxic building materials, hemp countertops, recycled glass tiles, cork floors and reclaimed furnishings are all part of her passion to tread as lightly on the planet as possible.

Advocating a “we” world instead of a “me” world, Brooks is board chair of OPCC, the Westside’s largest social-services agency that provides supportive services for the homeless, mentally ill, and victims of domestic violence. She is also board chair of Tim Robbins’ politically and socially relevant theatre company, The Actors’ Gang. An avid surfer, Brooks lives on a 5-acre ranch in Malibu with her husband Eric Cadora and their four dogs, two horses, two cats and a pig named Snorten Stenchouse Pigfuddles III.

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