The Unexpected Benefits of Carbon Reporting
Have you considered the value of calculating your carbon footprint? There are several reasons to undertake the calculations but there are benefits to consider too.
Reasons for preparing a carbon emissions report include:
You are required to provide the figures under your supply chain contract
You are seeking to sign a supply chain contract
You want to reduce costs and improve your profit
You are looking for a competitive advantage
You are environmentally responsible and want to have scientific data to support your words
To increase sales you know you need to appeal to environmentally-conscious consumers
There are the obvious benefits of more income, less costs, extended supply chain contracts and so on and then there are the surprising benefits that you won’t find until you’ve seen your numbers.
For example, Sarah, the founder of Little Flowers, an online florist in Sydney had a vision when she started her business over 10 years ago to have the bunches of flowers delivered by bike couriers. This vision became a reality after 6 months of trading when parking in Sydney CBD became extremely difficult and meant long walks to deliver the flowers.
On one particular day, she met a bike courier in an elevator when both of them were delivering to the same office, Sarah with her bunch of flowers, and the bike courier with an envelope of documents. They got talking and not long after he became her first bike courier.
Ten years later with 100,000 bunches of flowers delivered by bikes, she wondered what the environmental impact she’d made by switching from vehicle to bike deliveries. She didn’t know where to start or who to talk to, let alone what information would be required to undertake the calculations. And that’s where we stepped in and worked with her and calculated the carbon emission savings for her.
When Sarah received the report, she was amazed. The figures were so much more than she had expected, although she had no real idea what the numbers would be. She shared the results with her bike couriers who were just as excited about how much they had done for the environment. Everyone was happy.
Later that week as Sarah sat in her office and again looked at the report, she thought about her vision for the business all those years ago and she realised that she had achieved her vision. She felt grateful for that day she met the courier in the elevator and felt in her heart that all the hard work had been worth it. She had made a difference.
What unexpected benefit could you get from knowing your carbon emission numbers?
We are proud to advise that this article was written by the team and not produced by AI.