Our responsibilities

At Consider we are committed to conducting our business in a more ethical and socially responsible manner. We are doing this in partnership with our clients and suppliers by developing, supporting and promoting sustainable solutions that look to achieve commercial and ethical goals.

A peek inside Consider

Before we started preaching about Corporate Social Responsibility or trying to persuade our clients to adopt our ideas, we thought we ought to get our own house in order first. In the studio, we try to make sure all possible materials used are recycled. We reuse all our paper and when there is absolutely no room left to scribble down ideas, we recycle it.

As a result of this, we have reduced the amount of paper we purchase and use. Most of our clients are now happy to receive pdfs of invoices and other documentation through our online project management system (http://www.hotproject.com/). If there is a sufficient back-up of documents, there is no longer a need for huge hard copy filing systems.

Saving water, electricity and gas are also keen concerns. For example our water cooler is supplied by Pump Aid who provide clean water for third world communities, we turn off our workstations and monitors at night and there's plenty of Fair Trade tea and coffee to help us through the day. We are now encouraging the use of notebook computers amongst our staff as a means of conserving electricity.

On the job

Implementing all these ideas requires inspiration, with not a small amount of patience and enthusiasm. We know our team are our most important asset, therefore we are committed to providing a work environment where they feel appreciated, valued and able to produce high quality work.

Spreading the word

Several of our clients are involved with CSR and implementing good practice. We try to encourage and promote good environmental and social intiatives with all our clients; we suggest they print their direct mail and other literature on paper from sustainable sources where appropriate.

London Business School, for example, is taking these issues seriously. We produced the brochure for the Net Impact Conference at the School this spring, which focuses on CSR issues – obviously it was printed on recycled paper.

Supply and demand

We are currently working with our suppliers to increase their awareness of environmental and social issues. More and more printers are becoming ISO 14001 compliant than ever before; this being a high standard of environmental regulation that limits pollution and pushes for improved recycling rates. Additionally, recycled or FSC certified paper is more readily available at more reasonable prices than ever before. All this helps us to lessen the environmental impact of the print work we undertake.

But it's not just printed materials that have an impact. Online disciplines are often overlooked but it is an area that absorbs a huge amount of electricity through servers, firewalls and cabling. We have taken steps to address this by using a hosting provider whose servers are only powered by the wind and the sun (http://www.thinkhost.com/), we are in the process of moving clients over to Think Host too.

Of course, we haven't done all this without a little help. There are many useful online resources that have helped us with understanding what can be achieved and how to do it. Twig (http://www.twig.uk.com/) and Ethical Junction (http://www.ethical-junction.org/) have both proved invaluable.

In conclusion

Corporate Social Responsibility is a broad term which covers huge issues such as governance, responsible sourcing, eco-efficiency, environmental management, stakeholder consultation, labour standards and employee and community relations – all things that a business affects in its lifetime.

We haven’t tackled all of these yet – but we're taking small steps. We believe that whatever we do, however small, really makes a difference. And that IS the difference.