It has become the latest fashion for blue-chip companies with hefty marketing budgets to flaunt their green credentials in an effort to attract today‘s conscientious consumers. While some of these companies have a genuine interest in the environment, others have simply jumped on the latest marketing bandwagon, ’greenwashing‘ their products and services to appeal to modern consumers.

Whatever their aims, more businesses have begun to consider their environmental impact and as climate change continues to dominate the public arena, getting a comprehensive green policy in place is good for your business as well as the environment.

Taking the first step can be difficult and knowing where to start even harder. There are many things that you can do and a series of small steps can soon add up to make an impact

Sooner or later all businesses will need to make changes to their working practices in order to cut their environmental impact so it is better to make genuine changes now and let your staff and customers know that you are a forward-thinking company, rather than just following a trend and making more token gestures.

But taking the first step can be difficult and knowing where to start even harder. There are many things that you can do and a series of small steps can soon add up to make an impact and get you thinking along the right lines:

  • Recycle, recycle, recycle. Offices generate so much waste. Simply installing a recycling bin for paper or organising a collection scheme can make all the difference. You can also recycle old computers and office furniture

  • Use public transport. Where possible, use public transport to travel to meetings. This also makes travelling time more productive as you can get a lot of work done on the train

  • Choose green suppliers. From changing your energy supplier to a company like Good Energy (www.good-energy.co.uk) to using a green cleaning company such as Greenyouroffice (www.greenyouroffice.co.uk), there‘s an eco alternative for every area of your business

  • Bright ideas. Use energy-efficient light bulbs which cut emissions and save you money

  • Switch on to switching off. Turn off all lights and PCs overnight

  • Incentivise your staff. Encourage your staff to go green. Competitions or incentives for employees can make an impact inside of the office and out. As well as making your staff feel valued, it encourages them to come up with new ideas

  • Get the experts in. If you are serious about going green call in the experts to carbon balance your business. Companies such as Clevel (www.clevel.co.uk) are a great place to start

  • Use recycled, non-bleached paper. It‘s not that much more expensive and many companies now offer competitive prices. Also, if you print documents only when you have to and make sure that you are printing on both sides then you can also help to cut the amount of paper that you use in the office. Again, this can save you money

  • Switch office supplies to eco alternatives. To start with you could get your cleaning company to use products like ecover instead of traditional industrial alternatives. There has been much research to suggest that more toxic cleaning products like bleach can have a negative impact on people‘s health. So it‘s possible you could be reducing staff sick leave at the same time

  • Change from water cooler to water filter. A water filter will provide cool water on demand and save the wastage of plastic water bottles which can look unsightly anyway when stacked round an office. The water filter will feed into a water dispenser which works much the same way as your average cooler. At the same time encourage people to use glasses rather than disposable cups will also save waste

For more information see www.greenrocketgroup.com