It’s more important than ever to make your business as environmentally friendly as you can. This is because the damage that humans are doing to the planet is well-known, and now the technology is available to provide solutions to minimize the impact and the damage as much as possible.
In order to show your employees, customers, and your competition that you’re assisting the healing of the world in every way that you can, there are some new practices that you must put into place.
1. Initiate remote working conditions
Remote working isn’t just good for your employees and your business, it’s also good for the environment as well. This is because it cuts down on the amount of traffic on the roads and the pollution that this brings, as well as cutting down the amount of throw-away purchases that employees make while they’re at work. For instance, an employee working from home won’t typically require outfits for the office, nor will they be buying food items with disposable packing for their lunches or coffee breaks.
2. Cut down on promotional materials
You may think the obvious solution to this is to go completely paperless, and for some businesses, it has been. However, there are many customers, especially those of a certain age or older, that prefer to look at paper copies of promotional material rather than a computer screen or smartphone. By stopping the paper production of your promotional material, you’re fundamentally cutting out these potential customers from your customer base. Instead, rather than stopping these productions, perhaps the way forward is to look at smaller, A5 saddle stitch booklet printing for your promotional needs.
3. Cut down on single-use plastic
If you still have employees working on-site, you’re still going to have to have a cafeteria, and here, you can reduce even more of your resources. Encouraging your employees to bring in and use their own coffee cups rather than supplying them with single-use plastic cups every time they need a drink will lower your costs and protect the environment. It will also result in your business using fewer bin liners, as there’ll be less trash at the end of each working day.
Of course, you can add to this by investing in refillable toner cartridges for your printers and photocopiers. Keeping a stock of three for each unit will mean that you can have one refilled while one is in the machine and another is waiting to be utilized.
4. Opt for Pre-loved furniture
Another area where the environment is put at risk is in the manufacture of furniture. Office furniture has not, on the whole, changed that much in the last few decades, so you needn’t invest your money in getting brand-new furniture for your office and could potentially save money by purchasing pre-loved items instead. Of course, hydraulic chairs may need a new canister in order for them to work, but the expense of this is nothing compared to the whole process of having a new chair made and shipped to your office building.