Our journey to reduce our carbon footprint has only just started; we are proud of what we have achieved and what we have in our plans for the future.
Follow the Leaders
‘Every year, more efforts are being made in the UK to encourage companies to lead the way on climate action and become carbon neutral. According to a YouGov poll, almost half (46%) of companies said they have plans to be carbon neutral by 2050. These include some of the largest businesses in the UK, including SKY, Microsoft, Marks and Spencer, and Google’ Paul Collins https://climate.selectra.com/
Murano’s Carbon Footprint
As we all know, it is crucial that individuals, organisations and communities look at their carbon footprint and how they can reduce it. But what exactly is a carbon footprint? It’s quite simple; really, our carbon footprint is the amount of carbon dioxide that is released into the atmosphere as a result of our activities.
Like many companies do, here at Murano Eyewear, we use a variety of items which all add to our carbon footprint. These include paper, electronic devices, packaging, and water. We have looked at each of these and focused on reducing or changing how we use them. This has included reducing, and recycling where and what we can. Here at Murano, we take our sustainability seriously and look at a variety of ways we can ensure that our business promotes a healthy planet.
Recycling Where We Can
Reducing and recycling have been at the forefront of our minds for a long time. Our children learnt about it at school; some of us are lucky enough to be young enough to learn about reducing and recycling in school ourselves! Sometimes the most simple ideas are the most effective.
Murano Eyewear recycles everything we can, from simple things like cardboard and waste paper to more complex systems of recycling old documents when they are able to be removed. This sounds simple, but some documents which are required to be kept for a certain number of years require a strategy to know when to recycle and when to keep. None of us wants to have recycled next year’s tax information – or do we?
Recycling batteries, electronic devices and hardware such as printers, computers and laptops are essential to reduce our carbon footprint.
It can be a bit overwhelming when you start to look at your carbon footprint. But this change was a great start, and if it’s the only thing you can face doing at the moment in your business, then it’s a great start, and you should celebrate the beginning of your carbon-reducing journey. For Murano’s Eyewear, we want an embedded change for our business sustainability, not just an add-on. We hope to make reducing our carbon footprint underpin all our developments for the future
Reducing our Carbon Footprint by Reducing Paper.
Focussing on our paper usage seemed like the sensible step on our journey. We were an office where paper meant communication and storage – not anymore! Firstly we looked at how we used paper; we considered why a paper system is needed and considered other options.
We moved documents online for storage and sharing, we communicate via email or messenger, and we even do face-to-face! Many of you during the national lockdowns of 2020 and 2021 became remote workers but Alberto put a rota together for our personnel who were in or out of the office. We needed to be on-site to manage stock and more, we diversified along with you, just in a different way. Most of us had our first experience with virtual meetings. Whether on Zoom, Teams, Skype, or even Google, instead of travelling long distances for business meetings or events, we considered whether a meeting or forum could be hosted online. This saved staff commuting times and travel expenses and reduced our company’s travel emissions.
As well as communicating with our clients electronically, we send documents, including; order confirmations, invoices and statements, electronically. Making these small changes, we have significantly reduced our paper use and consider ourselves to be a 90% paperless company across our operations.
Transport accounts for around one-fifth of global CO2 emissions. So, if everybody travelled a little less, there is undoubtedly room for significant reductions in collective CO2 emissions. As well as communicating with our clients electronically, we send documents, including; order confirmations, invoices and statements, electronically.
A significant outcome of reducing paper use is that, at the same time, we reduce the use of our printers. Printers have a carbon footprint of their own. We considered the energy used to run them, the air/road travel to get the printer ink and the impact of the hardware on our carbon footprint. The result was that reducing our printing significantly affected our business sustainability. For printing, we still need ways to reduce further the impact printing has on our carbon footprint. We always print on paper we have used before, too; there are some great ideas here.
Considering our Carbon Footprint and Planning for the Future
There are lots of ways to reduce your carbon footprint. As a business with the highest standards in personal service and quality of goods, we want to evolve our environmentally sustainable working practices. There are a few things we have considered, and we have looked at what other companies are doing too.
Recycling Furniture to Equip your Offices.
Buying used office furniture is a great way to save your company a bit of cash. It’s also better for the planet. As already mentioned, reusing and recycling goods avoids contributing to the further depletion of natural resources like wood and metals. There are specialist companies who deal specifically in the used office furniture companies. You can pick up some cost-saving, high-end office furniture. Brands like Herman Miller and Haworth can end up in these second-hand shops at a fraction of their retail price – often cheaper than new, low-mid range office furniture would cost, and the carbon footprint is diminished along with the price tag! We think this idea is something we will consider when we need to undertake any changes in our office because buying used office furniture doesn’t have to mean you end up with low-quality furnishing.
Measuring your Carbon Footprint.
There are lots of companies that will help you measure your company’s carbon footprint. We liked this tool from the Federation of Small Business. It is important to remember that you don’t have to do everything at once. Life for small businesses is difficult at the moment, and any changes you make in your business will have a cost to you.
Like we said earlier, making a few changes is enough if that is all you can do. However, we all plan for our business. Making reducing your carbon footprint a priority when planning changes or developments to your business is a great way to start.
For example, when changing vehicles, could you change to electric? Is there a chance that your employees could car share, or could you offer more sustainable travel to work? The carbon footprint we stamp down just by using our road network is quite often the largest.
As we said earlier, furniture and equipment can be recycled. It is worth asking the question, do we need this change, or do we just want it? Making changes without good reason, perhaps it is a habit ‘we always change such and such every five years’ situation.
Understanding the Impact
Before we could understand how we could rescue our carbon footprint, we developed an understanding of what our carbon footprint was. We knew that it was about our planet, and we knew that it was about emissions. What we didn’t realise is how those carbon missions are made.
Carbon emissions are happening throughout our everyday lives. For example, both our personal and business transport: our daily journeys, whether by car, bus, or train and more exceptional trips, for instance, by plane. In our own houses and homes. The type of house we live in, how many of us there are, and how we use our energy all impact carbon emissions. Add to that our food habits and the waste we produce, and you can soon start to understand how making some small changes can have a significant impact.
Once you understand how our carbon emissions are created, it is easier to think through how you can start reducing them. There is lots of good information on this topic. An excellent place to start is the World Health Organisation. This article is an exciting way to familiarise yourself with climate change, giving an overview and looking at the impact.
Looking to the Future
We are proud of our changes and our commitment to keeping on going. Throughout the process of looking at reducing our carbon footprint, we have identified future changes we can make, educated ourselves and supported each other to make some changes away from work to reduce our personal carbon footprints. The most straightforward message we have heard is that if we all made even some minor changes, we would make a huge difference together.
We are running the most dangerous experiment in history right now, which is to see how much carbon dioxide the atmosphere can handle before there is an environmental catastrophe.” – Elon Musk