Printer soars to sustainability award

Printer soars to sustainability award

A historic Auckland printing company has won a prestigious sustainability award after cutting its greenhouse gas emissions by more than 30%.

Soar Printing won the “Reducing our greenhouse gas emissions” category at the 2015 Green Ribbon Awards, awarded by the Ministry of the Environment and the Department of Conservation.

The family-owned business, which was founded in 1920, has won numerous accolades for its sustainability credentials, including the Supreme Award at the 2013 Sustainability 60 Awards.

It is also the first printing company in New Zealand to produce carboNZero certified print products and services to the exacting Publically Available Specification (PAS) 2050 standard, which assesses the life cycle greenhouse gas emissions associated with goods and services.

Soar Printing Finance Director Jenny Carter, the granddaughter of founder Fred Soar, says in 2009 the company set a target of a 15% reduction in reported carbon emissions by 2015 but instead achieved a reduction of 30%.

“Sustainability has been a big focus for our business for a long time and we have achieved significant improvements in other areas as well,” she says.
“Our fuel consumption and waste to landfill have both reduced by over 40% relative to our turnover and number of staff since 2009.”

Soar Printing has also reduced its power consumption by at least 6% relative to turnover and number of staff since 2009.

It achieved these savings through a range of solutions such as switching to fuel efficient vehicles, conducting an energy ‘audit’ to improve energy efficiency and changing the roofing materials to improve natural lighting.
The business has also come up with some clever initiatives to get staff buy-in with the sustainability focus, including having competitions around recycling and fuel efficient driving.

“We have also introduced an environmental component into performance appraisals for staff,” Carter says.

“As a third generation family business that has been operating for nearly one hundred years, we firmly believe that it is the responsibility of each generation to leave things in better shape for the generation that follows.”
Soar Printing found that the process of achieving carbon neutrality is not as difficult as one might think and is good for business, saving the company more than $50,000 a year, she says.

“It does not necessarily require large capital investments, it saves valuable resources, and it can in fact reduce overheads and save money, even after paying for carbon credits to offset the emissions which we cannot avoid. Based on our experience, I would encourage other businesses to go down the carbon neutral path.”

ENDS

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