Environment and Sustainability Policy

SERIOUS Marketing Communications Ltd fully recognises its responsibilities to the environment. Based on the Environmental Act 1995 and in accordance with our action plan, following the London Mayor’s Green Procurement Code, we are committed to achieving ISO14001 by early 2010 through commitment to our environmental management system.

The objectives of our policy are to:

1. Comply with current environmental legislation
2. Consider and assess, taking action where necessary to continuously improve environmental, social and sustainable practice.
3. Emphasise to employees at all levels their own responsibility to environmental well being, giving training and information where applicable.
4. Display and provide this Policy to all employees including Sub-contractors and main suppliers.
5. Audit environmental, social and sustainability performance twice a year.
6. Review this policy taking in to consideration any audit findings as a minimum.

As a responsible business we look to provide a sustainable and social policy through sensible and achievable tasks that enhance the welfare and working environment of our staff, customers, suppliers, community and shareholders. Separate to this document our Policy Enactments document from 2007 onwards is available.

As part of the ethos of SERIOUS a number of environmental actions are seen as the norm, including:

1. Recycling – We recycle on a weekly basis all paper, cardboard, plastic, cans, glass. Office products which can be recycled are recycled. Poster and staff communication awareness is visible within the office and kitchen areas.
2. Stationery – We are looking to implement a new initiative to purchase 80% of stationery from recycled or sustainable sources. Where possible we will encourage our staff to re-use paper before recycling it. Wherever possible we proof by PDF, and we aim to achieve 75% of invoicing and ordering electronically by the end of 2009. We proactively source on behalf of our client’s sustainable paper, working with the FSC to gain their approval.
3. Energy - is conserved to the maximum by all reasonable measures allowed by the building infrastructure. As part of our action plan we ensure all our viable machines and other sources of energy consumption (lights and heating) are switched off at the end of each day. We review twice a year to assess any reductions and possible improvements.
4. Computers – 65% of our computers have in built monitors reducing the use of electricity. In the event computers are left on during lunchtime breaks we use automatic sleep modes on all computers as opposed to screen savers. All PCs and Macs are initially reused internally and are passed on down to administrative roles as they age. After the computers are wiped of data and software and made safe we offer them to staff and family and then to local charity ‘Princess Alice Hospice’. Should we need to dispose, we use the Woking waste municipal site where all such hardware is recycled.
5. Printing - due to the nature of our business we handle a large amount of print for our clients. With direct liaison with the printing industry that are responsible for nearly 10% of all volatile organic compound emissions, we actively encourage our clients to use recycled paper or paper which can be recycled with a limited use of laminates and to use organic or vegetable ink based products to try to help reduce volatile and organic compounds (VOCs).
6. Supply chain - We work with a preferred print and media supplier list, which have all been visited with an initial review on their capabilities. We have recently reviewed our roster of suppliers assessing their Quality Management, Environmental and Sustainability polices in line with our own.
7. We demonstrate where possible and advocate the use of Climate Care with our clients to help reduce carbon emissions and the overall ‘carbon footprint’ to help fund projects in green energy, energy efficiency and forest restoration around the world.
8. Travel- Our clients are based in London and the South East of England. UK travel is taken by rail and public transport wherever possible. Where car travel is unavoidable, distances are minimised. We endorse the need to travel as groups in private cars and invite staff to use public transport where appropriate. Public transport travel is our preferred method of transport and is now 90% of our day to day business travelling
9. Telecommunications - We have invested in conference facilities to speak with our representatives in Europe and Asia Pacific and we use VOIP technology and Skype where necessary to reduce our travel commitments.
10. We actively source our supplies locally.

We monitor, review and improve our environmental and sustainability policy half yearly.