It is our responsibility to protect the environment our brand is founded upon.
Measure. Offset. Reduce.
We measure all of our greenhouse gas emissions. From manufacturing our products, to delivering them through your door.
We offset our entire foot print every year by purchasing Gold standard verified carbon credits.
We reduce our future emissions by planning effectively and implementing a carbon reduction plan.
Through these measures we've achieved Climate Neutral certification. More than that, we've recognised that we need to be a part of the solution, we need to do our bit and then some.
What do we measure? Everything.
We measure what it takes to manufacture a product from producing the raw material through to completion of the product, whether that's in the UK or in China, Indonesia, Bangladesh or the USA. We measure what it takes to get that product here to our HQ, then processed and out to a stockist (which could be in the UK, in Europe or the USA) or direct to you, the consumer.
We measure our travel. We measure our employees travel to and from work, we measure going to events and to trade shows. We measure every trip the dewerstone van & truck take. We measure every flight, every trip to the factories, every sales trip to a stockist.
We measure our consumption. Oil, electricity, water, gas. We measure how efficient our HQ is.
If we do it, if it's in our system, if we are part of creating carbon from it, we measure it.
It's extensive. It's exhausting. It's the only way we're going to save the planet.
What do we offset? All of our direct, indirect and supply chain carbon emissions.
For 2019 that was 62 tonnes of carbon. We offset these buy purchasing gold standard verified carbon credits across three projects.
- Forestry | Acre (Brazil) (40% of portfolio) Working to maintain carbon sinks by keeping forests standing, while providing alternative sources of income and preserving threatened biodiversity.
- Forestry | Minnesota (USA) (13% of portfolio) Implementing smart forestry practices to improve carbon sequestration while providing water quality protection and conserving wildlife habitats.
- Landfill gas | Massachusetts (USA) (47% of portfolio) Installing gas collection systems to prevent harmful methane emissions from entering the atmosphere.
In addition to this we will plant over 10'000 trees on Biak Island, Indonesia in 2020 through our 'Every Tee = One Tree' commitment.
What are we reducing? The areas where we can have the biggest reductions in the shortest period of time.
Ditching air freight. We're switching all our inbound air freight to either rail or sea freight. As a small brand this is incredibly hard to do, it will take 4-6 times longer for finished product to reach us, it takes far more advance planning and is a much heavier strain on our cash flow, with cash tied up in product we do not have on hand for much longer.
The amount of carbon saved by shipping via rail or sea compared to air is unreal and this is something we are proud to already be achieving in 2020.
Going plastic free. We're already plastic free in our packaging, everything we use is recyclable and has been for some time. For our direct shipping off the website we use 100% 'kerbside recyclable' packaging - this means that everything we send out is easily recyclable in household recycling.
There's more we can do here when it comes to our supply chain and receiving goods in to our HQ. We are working with our suppliers and factories and are making a real effort to reduce and where we can completely eliminate plastic from every part of our supply chain.
We know that our customers share our values and demand we use the influence we have to lead on global issues like climate change.
Achieving Carbon Neutral certification isn't just a part of our image or a marketing campaign, it is part of our core values and the foundation of how we operate as a business.
We certified through Climate Neutral and more information can be found on our Climate Neutral dewerstone brand page.
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