Printers: Literature

A vital part of our business model is processing B2C literature in the form of fulfilment packs and brochures. As you can imagine, this requires a fair amount of printing. To make the process as sustainable as possible, we outsource a firm that goes above and beyond to minimise its environmental footprint. Registered to the internationally recognised ISO14001 Environmental Standard, the company is committed to reducing its environmental impact by adopting and refining sustainable practices.

The organisation’s compliance to the ISO14001 Environmental Standard ensures it continuously improves in environmental performance and control. Above all else, it’s unequivocally dedicated to implementing effective management systems to control any adverse impact on the environment by preventing pollution, managing waste and air emissions, encouraging the efficient use of vehicles, and providing on-going training for all employees related to this policy.

The organisation actions this strategy by operating in an environmentally-conscious way at all stages of the supply chain. From cradle to grave, the company strives to reduce waste transported to landfill, use recycled and certified paper throughout operations, decrease the amount of isopropanol alcohol used in the printing process, print using vegetable based inks, continue to utilise central compressors to lower carbon emissions and improve energy efficiency, and maintain the use of onsite multiple balers to recycle all cardboard and polythene packaging. The company is committed to a responsible purchasing policy, too, fully complying with FSC and PEFC certifications – badges of integrity that assure customers stocks are sourced from sustainable forests. 

By virtue of there being countless materials involved in the printing process, the firm is also fastidious about waste streams. Cardboard, for instance, is bailed on site before being collected by a licensed contractor and then processed for recycling. The recycling procedure comprises of soaking the cardboard in water to release the fibres, converting it back to pulp. Any contaminants, such as metal or ink, are removed, and the pulp is then pressed into sheets and dried. Though some of the fibres in cardboard disintegrate in the process, they can still be recycled around five times before becoming redundant. In the next chapter of its life, recycled cardboard can be used to produce more boxes and packaging.

Beyond this, the organisation takes measures to responsibly dispose of waste in a host of other ways: reusing wooden pallets in-house; recycling rubber printer blankets for use in the equestrian arena; reusing or recycling ink tins and drums; disposing of redundant monitors, computers, and IT equipment in accordance with the WEEE Directive; cleaning soiled printer rags for reuse; recycling all waste paper; sending all empty aerosols cartridges to a metal recycling facility; converting aluminium litho plates back to their raw material, using 5% of the energy required in primary production; utilising the flammable content of inks as low-grade fuel; and diverting inkjet cartridges away from landfill and routed to a manufacturer operating a recycling scheme.