From distribution and manufacturing, to retail and hospitality, introducing more sustainable purchasing habits is no longer just encouraged, but essential for businesses looking to meet the government’s Net Zero targets.
Julie Hadley, CSR and Social Value Manager at Banner, discusses how businesses can change their buying behaviour and optimise their waste processes to meet green objectives.
Understand your waste
The first step to changing your company’s buying habits, is to understand your business’ waste.
To understand your waste, you need to conduct an audit to get an accurate view of your weekly wastage. Conducting an audit yourself might be a tall order, but you’ll be pleased to learn there are a number of ways to analyse your current position. One way is to request support from your waste contractor or enlist the support of a third-party waste auditing service, they are usually the best bet for a really in-depth view.
The audit will quickly analyse your waste and accurately report on the number of recyclable materials being thrown out to landfill, as well as the company’s true waste storage requirements and where improvements can be made.
For smaller businesses, or if you’re just looking to gain a baseline overview of your waste data, a mini audit conducted in-house can be doable.
Approach suppliers and change buying behaviours
Once you understand your waste you can take a proactive approach to your purchasing behaviour by checking in with your suppliers to see if they can help the business meet its environmental targets.
The most obvious thing to ask for is whether any of the big contributors of waste can be swapped out for more sustainable alternatives, reduced, or avoided completely. Give some thought to the raw materials of the waste product itself, and even the packaging that was used to protect it. Once you’ve addressed the source of the waste, you can improve further by asking the supplier to advise on where order consolidation is possible.
Speaking from experience, this is a standard service at Banner. We use a calculation tool called Green Optimisa for customers that allows them to ascertain their current position and then improve their product choices and buying behaviours. They can track and reduce their road miles and consequent carbon emissions. Cutting down the frequency of deliveries to your site can reduce transit packaging and even the number of vehicles your business is inadvertently putting on the road.
If your supplier isn’t able to accommodate your environmental initiatives, consider switching, because there will be a supplier out there that can.
Optimising waste management
Once you’ve understood your waste and changed your buying behaviour to reduce it further, you can then consider how to manage the waste still being produced.
Often it’s easy to choose a waste collection company by cost, especially as average prices for material collection differ so widely, but price is not the only factor to consider.
On top of the obvious licensing considerations, you need to think about the number of materials a company can manage and recycle, the frequency and method of transportation they use, and the supplier’s ability to measure and track your progress to ensure you reduce your carbon footprint. By selecting a waste management service with an integrated sustainability action plan, your company can benefit from quick improvements in your carbon footprint, with minimal labour.
Train your workforce in recycling best-practice
Of course, changing your company’s purchasing and wastage behaviour is only as effective as the workforce behind it.
Through open and collaborative communication, employees can significantly contribute towards improving a business’ net wastage. Therefore, it is essential that your colleagues are properly trained and educated on what materials can be recycled, and how.
Some proven ways you can encourage better waste management is the removal of ‘general waste’ bins under desks, implementing more recycling points throughout your business and providing targets to incentivise your workforce into adopting more sustainable approaches to waste.
Improving your waste and purchasing behaviour is undeniably a daunting task, but it can have enormous and long-lasting benefits over the years. Not only can your company benefit from reduced upfront costs and improved waste consumption, but it can also reduce the cost of waste removal, improve business efficiency and most importantly, put your company on track to meet its environmental targets.
On top of all this, it’s also great PR and something employees and customers value highly these days, and helps improve your brand as an employer, partner, and supplier. It’s well worth investing in, and the right suppliers and waste management companies can make it much easier than you might think.
Banner can help optimise your waste
Read an example of how Banner helped a customer optimise waste here.
More Information
To get in touch with us, call your account manager, phone us on 0843 538 3311 or to become a customer email Contact.Banner@BannerUK.com.