Sustainability report - Our 2020
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We’re reducing the We’re proud to impact of our flowers say we have “Flowers. They make us smile. They light up a room. They make us 100% feel more connected. But, like most things, they also leave an impact on the planet. And because we all have a responsibility to clean up the footprints we leave behind, we’re working really hard to find ways that’ll let us all enjoy flowers without leaving a big impact behind. recyclable letterbox packaging I’m proud to say we’ve already made big progress. Over the last 0 year, we’ve started offsetting our carbon emissions, made big steps in the recyclability of our packaging (our letterbox packaging is now 100% recyclable!) and maintained zero waste to landfill. And we’re continuing to make improvements to help tip the scales. Over the waste to landfill following pages you can find out more about what we’re already 2.5kg doing and what we’re working on next.” CO2e offset per Co-Founder bouquet from September 2020
We’re offsetting our carbon emissions Over the past 6 months we’ve worked really hard to map our emissions across our supply chain. We thought it was important not only to include emissions from our direct operations (known as Scope 1 & 2*) but from our full upstream supply chain (known as Scope 3*). This means we’ve included all the carbon produced from our office, growing our flowers, transporting them, fulfilling orders in our warehouse and delivering to our customers. And it means that 2.5kg of CO2e is emitted to get every bouquet to a lovely customer, which is roughly the same as three bags of Italian pasta**. = What we’re doing next Right now, we’re calculating ways we can reduce the CO2e every bouquet 1 bouquet 3 bags of produces even more. Our aim is to cut this back to 2.3kg of CO2e in 2021. Italian pasta Keep reading to find out about how we’re taking responsibility across our supply chain. To help minimise the impact we create, from September 2020 we’re offsetting our carbon emissions by supporting projects around the world that improve lives * Source: Scope definitions as per the Greenhouse Gas Protocol 2020 and cut carbon. These include two Gold Standard certified projects in Kenya - the Burn Clean Cookstoves project and Aqua Clara Safe Water project. **Source: Carbon Catalogue, Global Publicly Disclosed Product Carbon Footprints (2020)
Our flowers We know that growing flowers to cut can leave an impact on the world we live in. That’s why we take responsible sourcing, growing and transport seriously. And we only work with suppliers who do too.
We source our Where do our flowers come from? flowers carefully 7% We work with ethical flower farms around the world.* Almost 60% of our flowers are grown in Europe and another 34% in Kenya. We take this diverse approach so that we can - as far as possible - avoid using heated greenhouses. When we can’t grow in Europe without these, it makes sense to grow in Kenya because - even with airfreight - the total carbon footprint of growing flowers in a warm climate is six times less** 34% than growing flowers out of season in hothouses that are closer to our 59% warehouses. Since learning this, we’ve become the first people to grow all-year favourites - like snapdragons - in Kenya to lessen our footprint. When we can grow flowers in the UK, we pick flowers naturally in season close to our warehouse to minimise unnecessary carbon emissions from travel. In spring and summer our UK grown flowers are picked less than 20 miles away from our warehouse! On the rare occasion we can’t source our flowers from natural Europe Kenya Other environments in Europe or Kenya, we do use heated greenhouses. After running a detailed audit this year, we know that only 18% of our *Colombia, France, Germany, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Kenya, Netherlands, flowers are grown this way. And it’s a big priority for us in 2021 to Panama, Turkey, South Africa, Spain, UK, USA. reduce this percentage further. **Source: Dr Adrian Williams, Cranfield University Comparative Study of Cut Roses for the British Flower Market Produced in Kenya and the Netherlands (2007)
We grow our flowers responsibly With careful pest control Mindful water systems Biodiversity projects Like all living things, flowers need water to grow. But our farmers Our flower farms in Kenya have special We work with farmers who can grow our flowers in natural are careful to minimise how much they use. That’s why they projects in place to help protect forests conditions, and use chemical pesticides as a last resort. use an innovative growing system (known in the industry as a and wetlands, while beehives and bat They pride themselves on their good agricultural practices ‘hydroponic’ system). This means they plant our flowers in trays boxes welcome local wildlife. Sometimes and use what’s known as ‘integrated pest management of water instead of soil. Sounds strange, right? But it uses 30% they spot cheeky leopards sleeping systems’, which greatly reduce any risks to our people and less water as nothing drains away into the ground and rainwater is amongst our carnations! planet. These systems work by finding ways to prevent pests from making a happy home in our crops instead harvested into the system. Clever stuff. of letting them settle, minimising the need for chemical sprays. And it helps to reduce wastage too. Thanks to this smart technique, every bouquet uses approximately 150 litres of water by the time it reaches you. This might sound a Our farmers use botanicals to control pests wherever lot, but it’s the same as a cup of coffee* or two bananas**. possible and only use pesticides as a targeted and very last resort. They also carefully monitor their total pesticide usage and are audited on how much they do use. = or *Source: Business & Human Rights Resource Centre, Friends of the Earth Report Documents Land & Water Footprints of Everyday Products 1 cup of coffee 2 bananas **Source: Water Footprint Network, Product Gallery 1 bouquet
We transport our flowers mindfully For deliveries across all of our markets, where we can, we work with couriers and postal services who offset their carbon emissions by doing things like financing renewable energy production projects. We’re also working with green couriers, who deliver our flowers on push bikes or in electric vans. From January-June 2020 these green couriers travelled 45,643km (that’s like flying from Aberdeen to Sydney. Then back to Aberdeen. Then to Bali!), saving 11,956kg of CO2 compared to if they’d been delivered by a diesel van. This saved greenhouse gases equivalent to 3,120,969 mobile phones charged or 2,404 gallons of petrol
What we’re doing next Reducing our air miles We’re aiming to launch a range of bouquets for the UK made completely of seasonal flowers grown on British farms near our warehouse. To make sure we don’t heat any greenhouses to do this, we’ll only use flowers that What we’re doing next Increasing are in season in Britain and happy to grow in our natural climate. So watch this space. our green courier targets In 2021, we’re aiming for at least 30% of our London deliveries to be sent by push bike.
Our packaging and waste We’re committed to making our packaging 100% recyclable and maintaining zero waste to landfill to make our process as sustainable as possible.
We’re responsible with what we produce We hate waste. So we make sure our warehouses send zero waste to landfill. In fact, we’ve sent nothing to the landfill for the last 5 years! Wondering how? We’re really careful with forecasting We sell lovely leftovers to a local florist We always recycle We have very advanced systems to help us measure demand If we still have any leftovers, then we work with a florist local Cardboard, plastic and wood we can no accurately. As a young, tech-savvy company, we’ve always to our warehouse who takes them to the flower market and longer use is sent off for a new lease of life. used data and predictive analytics to continuously improve gives them new homes. And because we send our flowers to our forecast accuracy. This means we only grow what our customers in-bud, they’re still in great condition on the rare We incinerate waste customers will want to buy. But like any forecast, we can’t occasion that we do need to re-sell them to our local florist. to make energy always get it 100% right (although we do always manage So even the things we can’t 95% or more). On the odd occasion we do have extra We compost green waste for recycle don’t go to waste. flowers left over, we have the following systems in place to other companies to use make sure they don’t go to waste. So any damaged flowers, excess foliage, leaves or leftover We hold special eco sales stem ends don’t go to waste. And the flower farms we use also compost their green waste. So there’s no flower waste When we can see we might have too many flowers, we offer anywhere in our supply chain. them to loyal customers at an amazing price. So they can snap up these beautiful flowers at the last-minute and we prevent them from going to waste. Win win!
It makes me feel great to say that our Our letterbox packaging is now 100% recyclable and free of single-use plastics letterbox packing is now 100% recyclable. This is Kerry. She heads up our supply chain. She’s been working Making all these changes means that by the end of this year really hard to find ways to make our letterbox packaging (which we’ll save 60,784kg of plastic and polyester from going to makes up 90% of our overall deliveries) 100% recyclable while landfill. That’s about the same weight as 929 fridges. still keeping our flowers safe on their travels. Over the last 18 60,784kg months, she’s helped us make huge, huge progress. Thanks to all her hard work, we now use... Kraft paper wraps (goodbye cellophane) Paper flower food sachets (goodbye plastic) Recyclable plastic plant bags = Recycled paper Ribbons made from recycled bottles Recyclable flower nets Vegetable inks Even the offer cards we pop in magazines and 929 fridges other companies’ boxes are made from recycled paper and vegetable inks!
How you can help Pop everything in the right bins Avoid sending your flowers to landfill Sounds simple but it helps massively! So here’s everything you need to know. When flowers are thrown away in the normal bin, they end up in landfill. As they break down there, they produce methane, which is a harmful greenhouse gas. Paper and cardboard bins Compost bin But the good news is there’s lots you can do to stop Cardboard boxes, arranging guides, Flowers, leaves, stems, plants your flowers ending up here. post cards, offer cards, paper wraps, flower-food wrappers, gift cards Fabric recycling bank Dry them and keep in a (or keep and reuse!) vase all-year round Plastic bin Ribbons Flower nets, plastic plant bags Press them to pop in a Made from recyclable HDPE, Normal bin photo frame or album these are accepted at local plastic bag Water bags for hand-tied bouquets, recycling points and by some councils Pop them in your compost bubble wrap around vases in your kerbside recycling or garden-waste bin
What we’re doing next Making our hand-tied flowers and plant packaging 100% recyclable too We use bubble wrap for our vases and ceramic planters to help keep them safe on their travels and sometimes our hand-tied bouquets are sent with water bags to keep them fresh when it’s hot. But we’re looking into eco-alternatives - like cardboard holders and recyclable water bags - to do the job instead. Our aim is to make all our packaging 100% recyclable by the end of 2021.
Our people What’s just as important as our planet? All the lovely people on it. Keep reading to find out how we’ve been supporting our team, suppliers and communities.
We’ve helped vulnerable people through the pandemic In the UK In Germany From March-August 2020 we donated £214,717 to From April-June we donated €12,348 to Nebenan the National Emergencies Trust Coronavirus Appeal Stiftung (by donating 1€ every time someone (by donating 15% of profits every time someone bought our Clara bouquet). This community-led bought Our Florist’s Pick). The trust has been foundation works to strengthen and create vibrant distributing this money to local initiatives to help neighbourhoods across the country. vulnerable people. Think things like care packages to families in Leeds who’d been relying on school meals to feed the kids. If you’d like to know more about the other places the money has gone to help, visit In France bloomandwild.com/national-emergencies-trust. From April-June we donated €875 to Fondation de France (by donating 1€ of the sales from three of our We also gave frontline workers 40% off our flowers French tulip bouquets). This amazing cause provides aid to help them stay connected to the people they love for vulnerable people in times of unpredictable crises. and miss, or to treat themselves to a little pick-me-up while times were tough. 183,349 super hard-working people used this code and we gave over £2.5 million worth of discounts to them.
We’re supporting our suppliers through challenging times As an online florist, we were very fortunate to maintain a strong demand from our customers throughout the pandemic. This wasn’t the case for everyone, so we increased our orders with suppliers and created new bouquets to support our French and Kenyan farms who were left with a sudden excess of flower varieties like lily of the valley and tulips. This prevented over 4 million stems from going to waste. We’ve prevented over 4 million stems from going to waste!
We work with ethical suppliers We take caring about our staff seriously, which includes everyone at our flower farms and warehouses. That’s why we only work with partners who have strong ethical practices in place wherever they are in the world. Our biggest flower farms in a developing country are those in Kenya, and across all these sites our partners offer... Support for community Free transport to and from work care projects, like So salaries aren’t spent Water aid for the Maasai community on work expenses Salary support for teachers Ethical-awareness programmes School meals Every supervisor on the farm has free Partner Africa ETI training Extra support for women in work Training & development schemes Generous holiday allowance Because everyone needs access to 1 year of maternity leave, with Everyone gets 30 days of things that help them learn and grow the first 3 months paid full annual leave and access to worker-welfare committees New mums being able to leave Health-awareness training early for 6 months To make sure everyone is safe, Subsidised food and healthy and happy at work Gender committees to support canteen facilities for all workers with and raise issues To help fuel everyone’s day
We’re creating a greener head office Although our team has been working from home during the pandemic, our office space is open for very small numbers of people who need it. And this year we’ve made lots of little swaps to make our ‘home’ kinder to the planet. From eco-friendly cleaning products, kitchen roll, toilet paper and sanitary products to recycled pens, post-its, recycling our coffee grounds and more.
We’re improving our diversity and inclusion Like many people, the Black Lives Matter movement made us realise we could do better. So we’ve made commitments to our customers and staff to improve diversity in our marketing and team. Earlier in 2020, we started featuring more Black and NBPoC models in our marketing, we’ve updated our marketing and PR media list to include a more diverse mix of publishers and we’ve updated our influencer base for fair racial and LGBTQ+ representation, too. We also chose to support the Steven Lawrence Charitable Trust. This South London Trust was founded to tackle inequality in all forms. It’s dedicated to transforming the life chances of young people and improving the world in which they live to nurture their talent. And as we’re a South London based business, this What we’re doing next Continuing to feels very close to our hearts. educate ourselves Internally, our People team have worked hard to strengthen our internal policy to better protect our team from any form of discrimination, working with specialists to help educate our team about unconscious biases (and how to question them) and reviewing our hiring process We’ve committed to ongoing training for all our new starters. to look for proactive ways to attract and welcome a diverse mix of This means that as our team grows we will continuously educate employees. ourselves on all topics related to diversity and inclusion. And we’ll be holding our first diversity survey so that we can report internally on diversity in our team and measure our progress year on year.
That’s all for now But we promise to keep being open and honest about our progress in the things we’re still working on! Got a question? Or think we can do better in a certain area? We’d love to hear your thoughts. Feel free to email us at sustainability@bloomandwild.com
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