Over a decade ago at B&B Press, we started our journey to become an eco-friendly printer. Since then, we've relentlessly measured and reduced the CO2 outputs from our printing company. It’s a challenge, but something the entire print supply chain should focus on achieving.
If you want to be progressive when it comes to climate change and give customers what they crave, we’ve got the inside scoop from a printer who’s done just that. From revisiting packaging to introducing hybrid vehicles to your delivery fleet, here’s how the print supply chain can make strides to reduce its carbon footprint.
Analyse Your Current Output
The starting point for any carbon reduction strategy is to take an in-depth look at what’s currently in play to determine the annual carbon emissions, you can then actively look at ways to reduce this. It's a good habit to keep record of this and continue to look at new ways in which you can become more environmentally responsible.
Analyse areas such as the equipment and machinery. Think about the paper you use, energy consumption, delivery distances of supplies and even the travelling distances to current consumers.
Next ask yourself these three questions:
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Are you choosing sustainable products?
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Do you choose to only work with suppliers who are environmentally responsible?
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Do you have an environmental policy or CSR to support?
Sustainable materials and kinder printing alternatives aren’t just a nice to have, but they’re also quickly becoming a necessity. Although we started our journey back in 2001, there’s never been a better time to pioneer professional and environmentally sustainable print.
Is your packaging protecting your products but not the Earth? There are an estimated 150 million metric tonnes of plastic in our oceans. That’s a colossal amount. At B&B Press, we've revisited our packaging this year to reduce our use of and dependency on plastic.
Just a simple change can have a significant impact on your overall environmental impact.
If you answered no to the questions in the previous section, have you considered working with a print supplier who uses an LED UV print press? The printing method is a modern and energy-efficient technique. Back in 2014, we were the first print company in the UK to invest in low energy LED UV print technology.
Using ultraviolet light for an instant drying process, the colours for brochures, booklets and everything in between are left more vivid and the designs are much sharper. All at no expense to the environment.
Our LED UV Printing Press is one of our most important pieces of equipment as this technique uses 95% less power than conventional infrared drying and it provides a quality piece of print.
We’ve recently just upgraded our LED printing press to a Heidelberg Speedmaster CX 75. Heidelberg built environmental protection into its corporate policy back in 1992 and has been developing new initiatives since then to mitigate its impact. Do you choose to only work with suppliers who are environmentally responsible? Our answer to that is yes, but what about yours?
Learn more about its benefits and how it can show your customers you’re environmentally conscious here.
Support the Work of World Land Trust
What is it that we can all do to help our planet? Protecting the remaining rainforests is so important to the future of our planet and that’s exactly what World Land Trust (WLT) is doing. It’s an international conservation charity that protects the world’s most biologically significant and threatened habitats acre by acre.
It’s not just that these rainforests act as huge carbon sinks, it’s the species that live within them that we need to protect too. WLT was one of the first organisations in the world to focus specifically on the conservation of threatened habitats through land purchase.
Working with partner organisations across the world, WLT funds the purchase or lease of threatened land to create nature reserves, protecting both habitats and their wildlife. If you want to take positive action and do something to make a difference, support the World Land Trust, one of the ways you can do this is by choosing Carbon Balance Print.
Carbon Balanced Print utilises REDD+ (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation) to fund the protection and restoration of areas of threatened forest, and reduce emissions that contribute to climate change. WLT currently implements a number of REDD+ projects from WLT’s self-certified projects in Ecuador to dual certified projects in Paraguay.
Choosing to Carbon Balance your print is one step in the right direction. Carbon Balanced is where the carbon impacts of a product have been estimated and an equivalent amount of carbon is prevented from being released or is absorbed from the atmosphere.
Taking positive action with Carbon Balanced Print is one way to help combat global warming. It also helps deliver against your corporate social responsibility.
Carbon Balanced Print can only be produced by a Carbon Balanced Printer.
Work With Suppliers Who Care
We're proud to announce we're now a certified Carbon Balanced Printer. The power of print just became more powerful. You can find us at B&B Press sitting proud on this page, showcasing just how dedicated we are.
After measuring, we’ve Carbon Balanced our low but unavoidable emission through work of WLT and offer our clients a full Carbon Balanced Print solution when printing on Carbon Balanced Paper. We have a unique World Land Trust Carbon Balanced Print logo that we can use on your printed materials, this communicates not just our commitment to reducing carbon impact, but also our consumers too.
We're doing everything we can to minimise the CO2 output as a business here in the offices and factory and will continue to do so, meaning we're offsetting only the unavoidable.
Part of “being brilliant” involves caring for our planet and making choices that can help make a real difference. We can help you do the same with our useful sustainable print checklist.
Know Who to Trust With Your Printing Requirements
Being environmentally friendly won't impact the print quality and it can be a huge benefit for your business. But first, you need to know what to look out for. This checklist is the perfect companion for print buyers and marketing professionals. We've made it easier to decide what you need out of your print to ensure you're making the best decision possible for the planet and your business.
Click the button below to get started today.
