environment

All over the world, offices are becoming greener. The main impact in the office can be made through our choice of products and our behaviour. Many things that happen in our office are out of our control, for example, how the office building is designed. We want to share our opinions on what a green office could look like and what we think are the best choices.

Most people have some awareness of what makes a greener office but here are some products which are not always on the “green” list that can help you take a more sustainable approach:

• Recycling Bins
• Battery Bins
• Recycling Labels / Signage
• China Mugs
• Whiteboards
• Smart Meters
• Low Energy Lightbulbs

Making your office “greener” can often be seen as an extra chore, with this in mind we have made every effort to make our environmentally friendly and ethical products as easy to find as possible.

Look out for these recognised accreditations and icons:

FSC – Trademark of the Forest Stewardship Council: an international non-profit association established to improve the management and prevent the degradation of the World’s precious forests. Paper products with this symbol are sourced from forests managed according to strict environmental, social and economic standards.

PEFC – The worlds largest certification organisation representing over 220 million hectares of certified forests. Products carrying the PEFC logo are independently certified and can demonstrate their commitment to sustainable development and corporate social responsibility.

Nordic Swan – The official Eco-label for the Nordic Countries. Criteria are determined on the basis of life cycle assessment (LCA) of the product group.

Organic – Any products with this symbol are made completely from a natural product and conform to a set of production standards for growing, storage, processing, packaging and shipping. These include: avoidance of synthetic chemical inputs, using farmland/plantations that have been free from chemicals for a number of years and strict physical separation of organic products from non-certified products.

Fairtrade – The Fairtrade Mark is awarded to products which meet international Fairtrade standards. It guarantees that excluded and disadvantaged producers in lesser developed countries get a better deal by ensuring farmers get a fair price and workers a fair wage with an additional premium to invest in community development.

Biodegradable – This symbol refers to products which can be degraded into organic matter by naturally-occurring microorganisms and leave no substances behind which are harmful to the natural environment.

Recycled Content – We don’t consider anything to be an eco product unless it is manufactured from more than 50% recycled content. Recycling is a good way to reuse and reduce waste that would otherwise end up in landfill.