New figures released by the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs show huge amounts of money and valuable resources could be saved by making a few simple changes to business practice. Steps such as switching off a single computer and monitor potentially saving £35 a year can have a massive impact on the bottom line of any organisation, large or small.

Simple environmental actions translate into real cost savings for businesses, and this message needs to infiltrate the workplace. It is easier than it seems to integrate energy efficient practices into everyday working life. If you are an SME owner, you can't afford to ignore the facts - switching off saves money.

Turning off lights, turning down the thermostat (even by one degree), cutting down on rubbish and fixing dripping taps – all these changes mean that firms stop ‘leaking' money.

The advantages of businesses adopting the green message aren't just confined to the environment. In today's environmentally aware society, a company's eco-credentials are more important than ever before. Resource efficiency is truly the cornerstone of good business sense and, in some cases it's the difference between a small business breaking even or not.

So, to help you reduce both your firm's costs and energy consumption, DEFRA is setting out ten simple ways in which businesses can make a difference...at the flick of a switch.

Rob Holdway, presenter of Channel 4's Dumped and Defra campaign supporter, joins us live on Thursday 19th November at 15.30 to discuss how your employees can make a difference to the planet and your balance sheets.

For more information visit www.businesslink.gov.uk/savingmoney

H: Lis Speight, host
R: Rob Haldway, presenter and Defra supporter

H: Hello I’m Lis Speight and welcome to the Business Show. Now then whether it’s recycling or turning the lights off, we all know the importance of being environmentally friendly when it comes to the home. But in new figures released by the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs it seems when it comes to the office we aren’t applying the same green practices. Huge amounts of money and valuable resources could be saved by making a few simple changes to business practice. Taking such steps could have a massive impact on the bottom line of your business regardless of the size of your operation. Well joining me today to talk about this is presenter of Channel 4’s Dumped and Defra campaign supporter Rob Haldway. Rob thanks very much for coming in, I hope you cycled in today – not!

R: Public transport

H: Well that’s alright! Now remember we are live today so if you’ve got any questions at all about how to make your business greener then do get them into us, all you have to do is to type your name and where you’re from and your question in the box that’s on the screen, press submit, it’ll come through to us here in the studio and we’ll try to get through as many as we can during the course of the show. Now Rob we’re all pretty good these days at being quite green at home. We’ve got the energy-saving light bulbs, we all try to recycle a little bit, turn off the telly at night, that sort of thing – but when it comes to the office we lose our way a little bit don’t we – why is that?

R: Well it is quite surprising that eco-friendly at home and that hasn’t translated into the workplace, and I don’t think it is actually as surprising as maybe you first thing, because at home you pay your energy bills, you pay your water bills

H: Yes

R: You handle your own waste, or recycling, and at work who does that?

H: Yes. We don’t take responsibility for it do we?

R: Don’t take responsibility so you can’t actually relate your own use of paper or your own lighting etc to the direct costs but it has a direct cost and that’s the big issue. This whole thing about resource efficiency, particularly for small businesses it’s about saving money and the collateral environmental benefits that come from that, so you do – if you have a greater awareness of what the costs are, and the burden, then you can do something about it, and that’s why Defra have done this campaign to make businesses aware, particularly small ones

H: So it’s not just good for the environment to recycle at work, it’s actually good for business as well – in what way? Explain that?

R: Well it’s good for your business because this is money straight off the bottom line, so this is actually – it’s not only about recycling by the way, it’s also about the energy that we use and the water that we consume, so the energy, water and waste in your business is very impactful. This is money that you’re actually just throwing away, putting in the bin basically

H: Yes

R: And this is straight off the bottom line. Companies need as much money as possible –

H: Yes especially in this day and age

R: Absolutely. So this is completely crazy. Now the point of the campaign is to say there are some things that are free to do – turning your thermostat down by one degree could knock about 8% off your energy bill

H: Yes

R: Your heating bill for instance

H: Wow. Which is a lot over the year actually isn’t it?

R: Absolutely so a dripping tap could potentially cost you £400 in water bills and a wash is about 38p, or thereabouts

H: It’s laziness a lot of the time I suppose isn’t it?

R: Well it’s just – you think it’s only small things, it doesn’t matter, but these things when aggregated across a business, no matter how big, across their whole business community as a whole,

H: Yes

R: Become very impactful at a national level in terms of costs. I think some of these simple measures that can be implemented, about £6.4 billion

H: Wow

R: Could be saved through simple resource efficiency measures. So this isn’t small change and I think this is why the government realised that helping small businesses with this campaign is the way forward

H: Ok

R: Starting place

H: Ok. We’re not doing that badly, I mean we are good at some things at the office aren’t we, like recycling paper for example – we are – give us some hope, we are good at some things?

R: Well it has to be a praise, praise punch really in a way – we’re getting better but I think the research has shown we’re still not good enough. The things is we talk about recycling a lot, recycling is the least best option above incineration and landfill, I much prefer the phrase of designing out-waste.

H: Yes

R: Do you need to print emails, if you are going to print things, print them double sided. And you think that the average sheet of paper might cost you a penny, then 7p to print, and then you’ve got to pay to actually have it taken away and you buy new toner cartridges

H: Yes

R: Start to think about the financial costs and the hidden environmental burden as well, these things obviously a bit silly. Other things like leaving your computer monitors on, quite innocuous in seeming thing to do, yet has a burden that costs you money.

H: So what are some of the worst things that we do in the office then – leave your computer on, printing emails when you don’t need to. Anything else you can think of particularly that are easy to fix but we don’t’ get round to?

R: Well there’s – the things we mentioned – not actually knowing stuff, companies don’t measure these things, they don’t exactly know how much heating they use, they don’t know where the energy comes from, they don’t know about their energy mix – they could even change tariffs to go to a greener tariff for instance

H: Yes

R: Looking at the cost implications – so changing where you are now is something you need to do. So auditing where you are now, putting a plan in place, engaging with all the employees and empowering them to get involved and then communicating that not only to your own employees but to your potential customers. So there’s a lot of companies now that are actually looking to market themselves based on their sort of green credentials, so if you want to supply a retailer for instance you need to think about how you communicate your green credentials, and that doesn’t look very good if you haven’t’ been resource efficient in your own business

H: Right ok

R: So again there’s a balance between being efficient now and thinking about how you might want to market your company on the environmental agenda

H: So how do you go about engaging your staff then to try and get them on the green bandwagon as it were?

R: Well there’s a – obviously a lot of information you can get, there’s a new website – details businesslink.gov.uk/savingenergy, so I’d advise everybody to go on there and have a look. Very useful tips. I think that should be communicated to the staff, there are posters and things that we’ve been linked to that you can put up and engage people on water, energy, waste etc. And I think it’s about communicating with them, asking them, empowering them, getting them to solve the problems – different companies, different sizes will have different approaches, and taking charge. If you run a business it’s your responsibility to make sure it’s as efficient as possible

H: Yes

R: So take charge of the situation, appoint someone else within the business to manage it and look after it, and that could be anybody at different levels, and really empower people, engage them on this agenda

H: And you sort of might think that if it’s just you putting your paper in, but then if everybody does it, citywide, countrywide, it really does make a difference doesn’t it?

R: Well it’s billions of pounds of potential saving, absolutely significant. Carbon emissions absolutely huge as well, because small companies are pretty powerful, they account for about half of the country’s wealth in GDP terms

H: Wow

R: It’s a powerful body, so when these, you know en masse, if they do something, carbon emissions massively reduced, the amount of waste going to landfill massively reduced, the costs massively reduced, you know it is a sensible ting to do, and I think companies are wising up to it, they just need a bit of guidance and simple steps. A lot of what we’re talking about here costs the business no money at all

H: Yes

R: It’s free, it’s just more of a cultural change than anything else and that’s why the website’s been set-up and why we’re sitting here now

H: Yes but I think we are getting there aren’t we, it’s just that there are a few more steps that we need to take. Is Britain sort of doing better than other countries, are we a bit rubbish in Europe or – I mean are we doing ok?

R: Well in general terms we’re getting better. Some areas of the UK are now getting up to levels of recycling, if I use that example, as Germany might be for instance, but it – I don’t know if it’s worth comparing ourselves to Europe actually, I think you know we have to look at what we’re wasting ourselves, and no one can deny the billions of pounds from all this other stuff- the greenhouse gas commitments and reduction commitments the government makes, you know all this comes together and we as a whole country in our own lives and in business, need to think about being efficient, and you know particularly small companies need the support. Big companies can throw money at it, appoint people to do it, even have a director of sustainability or whatever it is. Smaller companies can’t do that, they often perform multiple roles and they’re busy doing many different things, so understanding and having empathy with small businesses – this is what Defra acknowledge is important, and then ok let’s start them on this trajectory of change. Small, simple things that are free, and then maybe if you want to go re-insulate, rebuild your premises, whatever – that’s costly and it’s worth doing but only if it’s right for you, so –

H: Ok. Interesting stuff. Now we’re going to move on to some of your questions now, we’ve had one in from Barry Davidson, he says “I note that many of my peers are trigger happy when it comes to printing.” I know, I’m a bit bad for that. “How can you encourage a culture of consciousness when it comes to printing?” You go to the printer and there’s all this stuff there that people haven’t bothered to pick up – I’m a little bit guilty of that. How do you kind of change the culture? Well you can actually buy – printing is a big impact actually, there’s no doubt about that. Choosing printers actually that are a bit more energy efficient is a great thing to do, there are a lot of very good ones out there now. Think about the toner cartridge and all this, look at manufacturers that actually give you a good efficient rated product, so that’s something that you can do

H: And you can fill up the toner cartridges rather than getting new ones, that sort of thing can’t you?

R: 100% right, refillable system is very good although check the model, I’m not endorsing all of them. Don’t want to get a liability claim here! But the other thing is putting a printer on, a lot of people have their own printer on their own desk, that sort of thing – software programs now actually only print double sided

H: Oh right

R: So you can’t print single sided etc

H: Yes

R: So – and also do you need to print something? They talk about the paperless office, well you know, I don’t see much evidence of it anywhere

H: No

R: So it is an impact and it’s indicative – I run a business, I have an office and I know how much it costs me to print our stuff, and it’s not cheap. And I know how much a toner cartridge cost and it’s not cheap, it’s a lot of money, so you know I’m fully on board with doing everything possible to reduce that

H: Ok. Still on the subject of paper, hope we’re not boring you out there, Sam says “I’m a huge fan of paper-free environment but I work in quite an old-fashioned environment where people are paid to file things away and there are shelves packed with paperwork. How can I begin to persuade management that paper isn’t the future?” Similar sort of theme but it shows that there is a problem out there with people printing too much stuff

R: Yes that sounds like quite an antiquated business, unless they’re in insurance or a legal thing where they do need –

H: That’s the thing, people like the safety net don’t they of having it in their hand

R: Yes and there’s nothing necessarily wrong with that, I don’t know what the business is –

H: No it doesn’t say

R: So it’s very hard for me to comment, but data storage and all this other stuff, you know we are producing more data, I mean it’s two exobytes which is a billion gigobytes –

H: Whatever that means, sounds a lot doesn’t it?

R: It’s huge numbers of data. And I must also say something that you know emails and IT aren’t without their own environmental burden as well

H: Yes

R: And there is between 7-10g they reckon of CO2, carbon emissions per internet search

H: Oh dear

R: So –

H: You don’t think about the cost of the internet do you?

R: No it is a paperless office but the more computers we use, the more IT we use, you know the more burden there is there. So you know everything we do has an impact and it’s just about being measured and sensible and I think a lot of it is a cultural change, just getting people to think about what they’re doing and to have the ability and the willingness – the empowerment if you like to take actions

H: And take that leap of faith and stop printing everything out, because it’s on the computer, it’s not going to get lost, it’s fine

R: Yes the – back everything up, make sure you’ve got good data storage systems

H: Yes ok. Hope that’s of help Sam, good luck. Right we have one in from Elizabeth Procter, she says “some of the colleagues near me completely forget to turn their monitors off when they go for lunch, and when I remind them –“ lunch, what’ that? “When I remind them, I remind them they should, they think I’m being over-the-top. How can I convince them it’s the right thing to do?” So she’s being green monitor in the office and they’re sort of sneering at her a little bit. Difficult one

R: Well I mean that is a difficult one. Obviously an air conditioning system would be running by the way to actually cool the office because all these monitors are running

H: Yes

R: So there’s a burden there. Yes turning a monitor off at night – during the day, absolutely crucial thing to do. A very simple thing to do, you flick the switch, you know and that’s it. I think the average monitor that’s left on overnight is equivalent of the same energy as 600 photocopies for instance

H: Yes. Wow

R: You know there are equivalents here. Screen saver, it’s another myth that screen savers save energy. Apparently as I understand it, if you turn your screen save off and put it into a hibernate mode, the lap top for instance, it’s about £35 a year saving

H: Goodness me

R: In energy bill. £35 isn’t much money people say, so what but –

H: Well it is on a –

R: If I say to you give me £35

H: Exactly, yes

R: You know, why? So again

H: All these things add up don’t they?

R: Absolutely yes

H: And if you could maybe put a little not on everyone’s computer, I mean you can go to the boss and ask him, just put a little note on everyone’s computer to remind them maybe, and then everyone gets into the habit of doing it don’t they?

R: It is and I – you don’t want to bombard people with so –

H: No

R: Much stuff that they basically get turned off and go oh Christ here comes the eco-police

H: That’s right

R: You know this is just a waste of money, it’s costing our business money that’s straight off their profit, and you know everyone wants their business to be successful and to have money and to invest in stuff, and all these things added up can be quite – well hugely negative in cost-saving terms, so I think getting that understanding on the financial side of it, and the collateral environmental benefits is the approach that we want to take in this campaign

H: Yes. And especially for small businesses at the moment as well, because everyone is struggling a little bit I think, and if you can just save pounds here there and everywhere, it could be the difference between you going under and your competitor not, you know, it’s quite crucial for a lot of small businesses isn’t it?

R: I think so, I mean I don’t want to talk about – you know focus on the economic situation but it’s in all our interests to make sure the people we work with and for are not just putting money in the bin

H: Yes not just burning it

R: Yes you might as well just be burning it

H: Yes

R: Or putting it, you know in the bin, and I think that’s what people are realising more and I think that’s why having the economic argument is highly sensible because it’s stupidity in a way

H: Yes it’s just getting into the habit, changing habits isn’t it and then it becomes the norm

R: Changing habits

H: It becomes the norm

R: Yes and I think – I really believe in empowerment, people engage in the subject, making their own decisions and not being told what to do, people don’t like being told what to do

H: No

R: And that’s why the website’s there, useful tips that anybody in any company can go onto

H: Right

R: It’s not just for directors

H: Yes

R: And people who own the companies, and I don’t care if it’s a two-man band or 500 people in a business

H: Yes

R: These tips are still relevant

H: So everyone can do their bit then?

R: Everyone can do their bit, and I don’t – you know if your boss doesn’t – frankly – care – well change jobs probably I’d argue, but you know there’s posters you can put up or you can engage people and communicate and you know, just do it ground up

H: Yes ok. Well thanks very much for your questions, we’ve had quite a few coming in, keep them coming, all you have to do is type your name n the box that’s on your screen, press submit or send, it’ll come through to us here and we’ll try to answer them for you. Now Dan Ruback did just that. He says “aren’t most companies just using eco-policies to greenwash and pretend they care, but in practice it’s just more admin for everybody?” Green wash, that’s an interesting word – just explain what he means there?

R: Well greenwashing is when basically you say yes we’re really eco-friendly, and you scratch the veneer and you find that they’ve actually done nothing

H: Right

R: So it’s a form of blagging really, you’re just using the environmental agenda to convince people you’re better than you are

H: Right

R: And you’ve actually not committed yourself to it. I think there was evidence of that now, historically people making green claims that frankly didn’t stack up and there was no evidence to support it

H: Yes

R: You know, this is environmentally-friendly, well where’s the evidence, the research? Wasn’t there. Now companies, largely led by the retailers actually have an evidence-based approach, and Defra do a lot of evidence-based work, you know scientific research to find out what the impacts are, what you can do to reduce it and obviously how you can promote your products on that basis. So it’s actually saying this is a green product because of these reasons, this is an ethical product because we source it and these reasons, and we pay a fair wage to the people that make our stuff

H: Yes

R: Companies – a lot of companies now aren’t greenwashing, what they generally do is what they say they do, is what they genuinely do

H: Yes. So it’s not just more admin though, I mean in order to prove that you’re green do you have to fill in loads of forms, I mean is it more problematic for a small business?

R: It’s harder because of resource, but I mean I’ve worked with a two-man band toy company that wanted to get into a big, major retailer, it was a micro business but they were doing well and starting to sell stuff, but they wanted to get into a high street shop. We did a carbon footprint for them because they wanted to show that they were thinking about the environment

H: Right

R: Show their toy – in this case a toy – I won’t give it away – was good, and they’d thought about the ethical stuff, so they wanted to package this product and say it’s a good product, it performs its function, it’s designed well, it looks good, it does everything that we all want products and services to do, but at the same time we’ve got this provenance, and here’s the science to back it up

H: Yes, yes

R: So you know not every company needs to do it, but you can use the environment as a way of leveraging your product, or marketing your products and your company on that basis

H: And once you’ve done it, as long as you keep all those things in place then you only really need to do it once don’t you and then you’ve got that piece of paper

R: Absolutely. Small companies can do a simple audit, just knowing what temperature it is in the office

H: Yes

R: Looking at all these simple things and then saying ok look, let’s know what it is to start with, can we turn the thermostat down by one, two degrees. Can we not use air conditioning so often, they’re the big hitters

H: Right

R: That dripping tap, right I’m going to sort that out, you know it’s sort of – you’ll notice a difference in your bills and you know, well that’s why we’re here

H: Right ok. Jeff has sent a question and he says “how much money can I realistically save?” Obviously not very convinced, but he did save £400 a year for a dripping tap. Sounds like quite a lot

R: General rules – depends on the nature of the tap etc, but there’s a numeral behind every resource we’re using here. The lighting here, the taps, people leaving – you know how many times have we driven home and seen all the lights on in office blocks?

H: Yes

R: You know it’s clear – you have the switch on, it’s consuming power, it is costing your business money and of course we know what these figures are, they’re on the website and all this and the reasons are there, so it depends on the size of your business, it depends what you’re doing, but financial burden, so it is costing you money and who wouldn’t’ want to save money? I don’t understand

H: Exactly. Ok Jeff well I hope that’s given you a little bit of incentive there. That’s all we’ve got time for today so Rob thanks very much for coming in and sharing with us your top tips on how to get your business to be a little bit greener. For more information on how your business can be more environmentally friendly and save money at the same time, remember the website is businesslink.gov.uk/savingmoney. Well thanks very much for watching the Business Show and we’ll see you next time. Bye bye