Hello again!
It’s been a while (sorry!). Unfortunately, other priorities have overtaken writing lately, but I’m getting back into the writing rhythm and hope to post more regularly. I’m working on more posts around safety culture, our most popular and requested series which, with any luck will be arriving soon!
This post is going to be slightly different, however. Today, I’m proud to announce a new direction for our business. A green direction. We’re committing ourselves to working providing as many eco-friendly product alternatives as possible – ensuring it is as easy as possible for our customers to reduce their environmental impact.
It’s also incredibly important to us that the brands we partner with throughout this campaign don’t just talk the talk. Each brand is vetted to ensure green washing isn’t taking place.
As such, the first truly environmentally friendly brand we’re incredibly proud to partner with: Green Warehouse, manufacturers of some of the highest quality waste disposal bins we’ve come across – and they’re 100% eco-friendly.
But first, a couple of statistics:
- The UK recycling rate for household waste was 45% in 2018. This is decrease from the 45.5% rate in 2017. The target set by the European Union is to recycle at least 50% household waste by 2020.
- It is estimated that commercial and industrial waste generation stands at 36.1 million tonnes in 2017 and a further 37.2 million tonnes in 2018.
I’m not presenting these statistics as the end of the world, nor the only ones that matter when it comes to waste disposal – far, far from it. Only as a reference point, as without collective effort, a further fall in global green credentials could be the end.
But, baby steps.
So who are Green Warehouse?
Established in 2001, Green Warehouse today are specialist manufacturers of office recycling bins. The company’s products represent their values:
- Sustainability
- Integrity and honest
- Seeking perfection
- Innovation
- Simplicity – both products and operations
Green Warehouse’s eco credentials have been proven through their operations with 100% of electrical energy used coming from 100% renewable sources and keeping material use (such as packaging) to an absolute minimum.
A company who don’t simply talk the talk, the products manufactured by the business are impeccable. While I won’t provide a breakdown of all of them, I have to talk about one that I’m personally excited about:
uBin
Award winning – internationally. Winner of the recycled plastic product of the year, highly commended by the Zeo Waste Awards, environment and energy awards finalist – to name but a few. The uBin is made from 100% post-consumer recycled plastic, this is plastic such water bottles, containers and other items that we use every day that have been diverted from the landfill.
This is recycling in its purest form, however as post-consumer recycling is so difficult – it is far less common than, say post-process recycling, whereas off cuts from manufacturing processes are repurposed and subsequently remoulded.
The uBin is the only post-consumer recycled bin in the world. That’s right, the world. The uBin’s post consumer recycling process can be seen in this 1 minute video.
Not only is the bin award winning and environmentally friendly, it’s innovative. It’s tall, yet slender designs allows a 70l capacity but stops being having to bend down to throw rubbish away. A separate joining clip allows for a highly cost-effective recycling station. Finally (though I could definitely go on), the sloping lid while a simple idea, prevents rubbish being left on top of the bin.
Our commitments
Green Warehouse and those that we are currently establishing new partnerships with, it would be entirely hypocritical of us not to follow in their footsteps. So, we have committed to working towards the following goals:
- Recycling: Massively increase the amount of commercial waste we recycle. The majority of our packaging materials already come from recycled sources, however we want to go further and ensure general waste is reviewed and recycled on a more stringent basis.
- Upcoming renovations: we recently took on an older premises that requires some work, at the forefront of our plans will be ensuring our building is environmentally friendly – such as ensuring energy efficiency.
To conclude...
I’m very excited to be working with Green Warehouse moving forward and I can’t wait to see the future innovations they produce. All of their products are available to view on our website here. I’ll be posting more regularly soon, if you would like a notification when a new blog is posted, pop your email address in the box in the footer of the page and I’ll keep you posted!
P.s
You can see a breakdown on how you can recycle Green Warehouse’s products here.