Greening Our Operations
Reducing Operational Impacts on the Environment
Indigo continues to examine how it does business and identify ways to improve our operational impacts on the environment. Many areas of our business have adopted new ways of doing things. While we recognize that there is much to be done, we wanted to share some of our successes with you.
Waste Management
Waste management is a challenge for Indigo given that we are legally obligated in the majority of our lease arrangements to adhere to the waste management practices of our landlords. Unfortunately, this limits some of what we can do. Indigo does have control of the waste management practices at 66 store locations. At these stores recycling programs are in place with an average waste diversion rate of approximately 64%. In fact, since 2007 Indigo's recycling efforts have increased by 30%. We continue to investigate additional solutions for all of our stores.
Gift Card Program
Indigo continues to reduce the amount of plastic going to landfill via gift cards. With the introduction of recycled PVC gift cards, Indigo is the one of the largest users of recycled plastics in Canada for the production of plastic cards. From 2008 -2010, with the production of over 8.5 million cards with recycled content and the collection of used cards from our customers, Indigo has diverted more than 42,000 pounds of material from landfill!
Carpet Recycling at Chapters Store, South London
The store has recently replaced its carpets. Wanting to ensure that we reduce waste and replace the carpet with a sustainable option, Indigo worked with Interface Flor, a pioneer in sustainable flooring products. Through this initiative, 5400 pounds of the old carpet was removed and recycled, ensuring that it was diverted from landfill. This is equivalent in weight to all waste produced by two Canadians for an entire year!
Paper Consumption and Purchasing
Indigo has taken steps to improve its paper practices and have increased the use of FSC certified paper in our marketing and other printed materials. In fact, Indigo has been using FSC certified paper in many of its marketing pieces since 2006. In 2008, Indigo initiated a company wide paper audit to assess paper use throughout the company. Understanding our paper use is important as it provides our company with the necessary benchmark to meet an aggressive 25% paper reduction goal by 2012.
The audit was crucial in helping us identify those areas of the business where we could increase the amount of recycled and FSC certified paper as well as identify areas for paper reduction. From 2007-2008, Indigo reduced paper consumption by 6% and increased use of recycled paper by 61%.
Indigo also implemented a number of paper reduction initiatives including using 100% recycled photocopier paper, ensuring double sided printing, and eliminating fax machines in favor of desk-top faxing. The Worldwatch Institute says the average U.S. office worker goes through 12,000 sheets of paper a year. Requiring employees to use both sides of the paper at the printer helps reduce overall paper use.
Distribution Centre Packaging
Recognizing that our Distribution Centre warehouse uses a significant amount of packaging, various steps have been taken to ensure that the products we use are produced sustainably. For example, all corrugate shipping materials, including boxes and overwraps, are produced using 100% post consumer content and can be recycled and reused again. The plastic dunnage materials used to securely ship some of our more delicate products are also recycled in-house.
Sustainable Books: Indigo’s Environmental Paper Policy
Indigo recognizes that as the largest retailer of books in Canada, that the paper in the books on our shelves represents a significant part of our carbon footprint and that to address this requires a supply chain approach. That's why Indigo developed an Environmental Paper Policy to encourage the publishing industry to use more recycled paper in books and to ensure that paper is being derived from sustainably managed forests.
Did you know that...
- the average book, through all stages of production, retail, and publishing activities, emits about 8lbs of carbon?
Source: Environmental Trends and Climate Impacts, Book Industry Study Group, Inc. and Green Press Initiative, 2008.
- that compared to copy paper made from 100% virgin forest fibre, a copy paper made from 100% recycled content reduces:
- total energy consumption by 44%
- net greenhouse gas emissions by 38%
- particulate emissions by 41%
- wastewater by 50%
- solid waste by 49%
- wood use by 100%
Source: The State of the Paper Industry, Monitoring the Indicators of Environmental Performance, Steering Committee of The Environmental Paper Network, 2007.
- that by printing 960,000 copies of Harry Potter on New Leaf EcoBook 100 paper that there was an estimated environmental savings of:
- 29,640 trees
- 633,557 kilograms of solid waste
- 47,007,044 litres of water
- 20,248 BTUs of electricity (195 years of electric power required by the average home)
- 1,215,443 kilograms of greenhouse gases (3,900,000 kilometres equivalent driving the average car)
Source: The State of the Paper Industry, Monitoring the Indicators of Environmental Performance, Steering Committee of The Environmental Paper Network, 2007.
Book Product Donation Program
In late 2009, Indigo developed its Book Donation Program where unsold books are donated to literacy organizations in need. Through this program, Indigo works with seven literacy-focused and charitable partners. This donation program not only improves our waste management practices by keeping these products out of landfill, which is a main focus for Indigo, it also ensures that they find a good home while helping those in need. Since the program began, Indigo has donated more than 80,000 books and notebooks worth approximately $200,000.
Frontier College
Frontier College operates a variety of literacy programs in locations across Canada. They recruit and train volunteers to work with children, youth and adults in an array of settings. They also help other community-based organizations to set up and run literacy programs for their own participants. Since 2010, Indigo donated over 21,000 notebooks and pads as well as 300 electronic dictionaries to Frontier College.
National Plastic Bag Reduction Program
As part of our efforts to reduce waste in the local communities where we operate, Indigo aims to reduce the number of plastic bags used in our stores across the country. To do this, Indigo charges a five cent fee on plastic bags and also provides customers with a reusable bag option. Last year, Indigo reduced plastic bag consumption across the country by 53%.
Proceeds from these fees are used to support a number of initiatives aimed at improving Indigo's sustainability commitments and include supporting our newly created store Green Teams, covering the costs of transporting donated scrapped books and products to our charitable partners as part of Indigo's Product Donation Program; help conduct waste and energy reduction work; and support Canopy, an environmental organization that works to improve responsible paper sourcing in books. Any surplus from these fees will be donated to the Indigo Love of Reading Foundation which promotes childhood literacy. It is Indigo's intention to use these fees to effect positive change.