Print.IT Reseller - issue 71

VOX POP 01732 759725 42 The second edition of Quocirca’s Print 2025 market insight study found that sustainability has leapt up the corporate agenda. The majority of respondents expect sustainability to be highly important to their business by 2025, while 52 per cent of IT decision-makers state that lowering environmental impact is the number one print management challenge they face, outweighing cost reduction and security Sustainability climbs the corporate agenda: Part One Mark Bailey, Managing Director, EBM “The printer industry isn’t renowned for its environmental conscience, but if you take a closer look, manufacturers are making some real progress. At EBM we want to pass this on to our clients. We want to go further than simply providing more efficient printers with less waste. We see it as our responsibility to make sure we reduce our own impact, as well as our customers as much as possible. “As a managed print provider, we recommend rules-based printing which can enforce a number of policies across print devices, such as printing double- sided by default or deleting uncollected jobs after a set period of time. These are just some of the policies that act to reduce waste and give control over the print fleet. This means less paper, less ink/ toner and less wasteful printing. “We also provide customers with the opportunity to enter into our Green Print Programme. The aim of this is to offer clients a means of addressing the carbon footprint generated by their print operations. Once a year, EBM calculates the CO2 produced by each client’s print operations. This includes the power used to run the printer and diesel used for site visits. This is invested in a Quality Assurance Standard (QAS)-verified offset project on behalf of our clients. “Our environmental policy includes an action plan to measure and reduce our carbon emissions. We’re aiming to achieve carbon neutrality again in our office operations in 2020, whilst continuing to drive down the environmental impact of our fleet operations. Earlier this year, we offset 100 per cent of our 2019 carbon emissions, which amounted to 24.43 tonnes of CO2. In addition, we also use renewable energy provider Bulb, which lowered our overall impact more. “We are very conscious of the environmental impact companies can have. We see it as our responsibility to make sure we reduce our own impact as much as possible. We strive to address this throughout the business, whether this is through offsetting, using renewable energy, or implementing our environmental policy.” www.ebmltd.co.uk Alex Tatham, Managing Director, Westcoast “As sustainability becomes an ever- increasing consideration on any tender response and any GenZ young person considers an organisation’s environmental credentials before even applying for a role – it is no surprise that a company’s position on sustainability is increasingly important for their business interests. “Yet boards are also increasing their focus on sustainability – and for Westcoast, this involves both establishing our suppliers’ positions as well as ensuring Westcoast is improving its own credentials and policies. These can be micro – i.e. using recycled material in packaging, ensuring that employees use Microsoft Teams more to reduce their travel requirements – or more macro – deciding which products to sell dependent upon their environmental impact and which partners to deal with. “Print has always been an issue in advance of the environmental questions posed to it – largely because it has a negative effect on the environment. Printing less is seen as a good thing for the environment as paper is generally considered an environmentally expensive product. However, print companies have been working on this issue for longer and have made great strides in their focus on producing less wasteful, more recyclable Almost two-thirds of respondents to the study said they expect suppliers to adopt a leading position on sustainability by 2025. In light of this, PrintIT Reseller invited a panel of industry leaders to explain how they have embedded sustainability within their own business and how they are helping clients to reduce the environmental impact of print. Mark Bailey Alex Tatham