Scientists and Governments seem to change their mind daily on how we are affecting the environment and how best to counteract our impact on the world around us.
In our business this makes it difficult to agree one firm policy that can help you the consumer decide who is the ‘greenest’ printer. Often you will find yourself wading through the marketing spin to find the facts. What we have set out below outlines the way we work and the choices and investments we have made to ensure that we continue to work ‘realistically’ whilst still considering our impact on the environment. We want you, as a customer of Windrush, to be secure in the knowledge that we will make real efforts to reduce environmental damage from any print project we undertake for you.
Because our business is all about personal service, we understand the impact that we, personally and collectively, can have on our environment. We can all choose to work in a way that will impact as little as possible and even go some way to benefiting the immediate environment around us.
We have made our own choices, based on our own beliefs about the environment, and our own understanding about how we can reduce ours and your carbon footprint. We know that these practises make a difference to us and they can do the same for you.
The choices we have made so far are:
Sourcing ALL paper and board from sustainable forests certified in accordance with the FSC (Forest Stewardship Council) and the PEFC (Programme for the Endorsement of Forests Certification). We also use recycled papers, when requested, but our recommendation is always that ‘sustainable’ is better, with reduced cost and less impact and energy to produce. See our information on what FSC means to you.
Invested in Azura computer-to-plate technology to eliminate the waste film and photographic chemical waste from this process. We use NO chemicals and NO water in this process. Compared to the so called environmental waterless printing process which uses additional chemicals and ironically still requires vast amounts of ‘water’ to process the plates required to print ‘waterless’. Azura is the only plate system on the market that is completely chemistry-free.
Introduced vegetable oil based inks to all presses and which are virtually VOC (volatile organic compound) free.
Reducing the creation of waste by improving operating practices and by recycling materials whenever practical. This means that all paper waste, including our design and production offices, is collected for recycling.
Investing in the development of new products and processes that have an improved performance regarding their impact on the environment. The most recent investment is our new five colour press which has replaced two smaller four colour presses and has a greatly increased efficiency and so reduced energy waste.
Purchasing company vehicles that have lower carbon dioxide emissions and improve on fuel efficiency, combining deliveries where possible.
We aim to offer our services in design and print as locally as possible. The principle of sourcing food more locally is a growing argument, which we wholeheartedly embrace, and we firmly believe that, if applied to other businesses, the carbon impact of all of us can be reduced. Why stop at food?
