We work to help ensure a healthy environment for future generations.
Staples is determined to positively impact the world around us. From innovative, environmentally friendly products to carbon and energy initiatives, we believe reducing the effects of climate change is everybody’s responsibility. Staples strives to make it easy for our customers, associates, and the communities we serve to join us in protecting the environment. This includes offering customers a wide assortment of environmentally preferable products, operating our business in a sustainable manner, and providing recycling and other services to help our customers meet their environmental goals. Our environmental commitment is two-fold: what we do to reduce our impact, and how we help our customers to do the same. We call this commitment Staples EcoEasy.
But in addition to reducing our impact on the environment, our EcoEasy commitment helps to further reduce costs and improve our business performance. Our environmental approach is not only the right thing to do, but makes good business sense, and is a part of our day-to-day lives at Staples.
EcoEasy: Our Business Operations
We recognize the value to our business of an environmental management system and have obtained ISO14001 certification in over 30 facilities throughout Europe. This provides a system for us to observe, control, and improve our environmental performance, not only helping us to comply with relevant legislation, but also helping us to improve our performance through pollution prevention and resource conservation.
Across all our operations, we continuously look for opportunities to reduce our environmental impact. One specific example of this is the installation of Jivaro technology that minimizes the waste in our shipping boxes, as the machines automatically cut the boxes to the right level of fill. Additionally, in many of our delivery vehicles we use speed limiters, which keep emissions to a minimum and maximize fuel efficiency. Likewise, we also reduce our carbon emissions through the purchase of alternative energy, as demonstrated by our multiple rooftop solar and wind installations and our purchases of green power. Furthermore, we have various recycling programs in place in our facilities for pallets, plastics, paper, ink and toner, and technology items. And finally, our implementation of lighting sensors in many facilities further reduces our energy consumption.
EcoEasy: Services for Our Customers
We feel it is important not only for us to focus on the environmental aspects of our own operations, but also to help our customers to reduce their impact. One way that we assist our customers is through recycling programs for their ink and toner cartridges, reducing waste to landfills and saving resources. Additionally, we can help our customers to consolidate their orders for fewer deliveries, resulting in decreased carbon emissions. Furthermore, through our online ordering platform and electronic invoicing options, our customers can reduce their paper usage.
By helping our customers to consolidate their purchases from multiple vendors to just one, they benefit from reduced procurement and invoicing costs, and superior program management and reporting, while also making a positive impact on the environment. We do this through our comprehensive offering of office products, furniture, technology, facilities, and promotional products.
Of course, there are many other simple ways that we provide consultation to our customers in order to help address their environmental footprint. For example, we offer suggestions for setting printers to double-sided printing, using technology instead of paper, eliminating cover pages, reusing paper products, placing recycling bins near copiers, purchasing via online catalogs instead of print, turning off monitors when not in use, and powering down computers at the end of the day.
EcoEasy: Product Assortment (Coming in 2010)