April 22nd marks Earth Day, a day to remind every single occupant on this planet to protect the environment. Earth Day is about taking action in any way you can - whether as a multi-million pound conglomerate, a small family business or an individual.
A great celebration, right? But this is why I'm apprehensive about writing this blog today: as a consumer, I believe there's a huge stigma around companies when it comes to climate change. The internet is rife with greenwashing and, ultimately, businesses feel the need to essentially defend themselves when someone asks; 'Well, what exactly are you doing to help?'
When it comes to battling the climate crisis, we're eager to be open and honest with everybody. As a family, we're not about greenwashing, because we recognise climate change as a serious issue - plus, it's my (Holly's) number one cause that I can often be heard going on and on about. Sustainability is at the forefront of our minds, day-to-day.
Many businesses are unable take that giant leap to become as green as possible: including ourselves. We would LOVE for our product to be 100% recyclable and our business to be fully sustainable. The truth is, we can't be - not yet. But that's not to say we're doing nothing to give back to the planet.
Today we became aware of Ecologi and we signed up immediately. We are a very eco-conscious family regardless, so when we looked more into Ecologi's carbon offsetting solutions and found out that, actually, this is how we as a business can take another small step against climate change, it was a no-brainer.
Ecologi uses funds from the subscriptions of businesses and individuals to plant trees and fund impactful projects that take on climate change. This helps to offset the company/person's carbon impact on the planet. (This is not a sponsored advertisement, by the way, we just think it's fantastic!)
Our profile can be seen here: https://ecologi.com/cheshirebotanicals and is also accessible via the main menu on our website. You can pop on to the page whenever you like to track our achievements. Below our initial info, we've included our sustainability goals - some of which we've completed, others of which we're working towards.
You, too, can sign up to Ecologi - read more about how it works here.
Please feel free to read on further and check out what we're doing to combat climate change as a small business, as well as our future sustainability aspirations.
Have a great Earth Day and a lovely weekend.
All the best,
-Holly.
Our Sustainability Achievements (no matter how small) So Far:
- We use 100% plastic free Flexi-Hex packaging for shipping out orders.
- We use Royal Mail's low carbon delivery service for online orders.
- Our shipping labels are printed with a thermal printer as opposed to ink and paper.
- No packaging goes to waste in our office. If we get bubblewrap through the post, we'll be re-using it for deliveries.
- No empty gin bottles go to waste. We reuse all of our empties and up-cycle them to become bottle lights, which will be available again very soon.
- We work with a local distiller who is based under thirty miles from our office. This allows for low travel miles when transporting products in bulk.
- We prefer to use 100% natural and wood top stoppers for every gin bottle.
- We order in bulk. Unfortunately, our bottles are made in and shipped from Europe. Why? There are two main spirits manufacturers in the U.K., whose minimum order quantities we are not able to fulfil at this stage of our business journey. For the time being, we ensure our bottles are shipped in bulk to avoid unnecessary travel miles.
- The glue used for our labels is 100% vegan.
- We are subscribers of Ecologi.
- We use OceanHero as our main internet browser, as both a business and a family. At the time of writing, we have generated enough funds to recover 346 plastic bottles from the ocean since January 1st 2022.
- Two out of three of us are vegetarian! (We're working on the third... mwah-ha-hah.)
Our Sustainability Goals:
- The heating in our office is set to be connected to a Ground Source Heat Pump.
- We will be converting to an electric car for deliveries when possible.
- A huge goal is to create our own bespoke bottle, of which we will be removing unnecessary weight from the glass and using a minimum of 80% of recycled glass to create. (Why have we not done this yet? The inability to meet a minimum order quantity.)
- Convert all of our labels and stickers to 100% sustainable and recyclable material. (Why have we not done this yet? The right solution for us just isn't available - yet. We are keeping an eye on developments in the industry, such as Frugalpac, and we're always in search of sustainable label printers.
This is how we're battling climate change as a small business, and how we hope to improve in the future. Please feel free to reach out if you have any questions or suggestions.