Easy ways to smash sustainability goals in your business through design & marketing

16 Oct Easy ways to smash sustainability goals in your business through design & marketing

Posted at 15:08h in marketing, sustainability by admin

Here’s A Helpful List Of Sustainable Print Design Solutions

Print design, while often seen as less eco-friendly, can be made sustainable through several strategies. The use of recycled paper and eco-friendly inks reduce the carbon footprint and are often more cost-effective in the long run. At TGM we are proud that our print partner is a Toitū carbonzero certified business. Consider these materials next time you are looking to produce any promotional materials.

Eco-Friendly Paper Products.

Be the hero you were always destined to be by specifying that your marketing is produced on Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) Certified Paper. This ensures that the paper comes from responsibly managed forests that provide environmental, social, and economic benefits. This certification helps protect forests and promotes sustainable forestry practices.

Or save an extra tree or two with Post-Consumer Waste (PCW) Paper. This is made from paper that has been used and recycled by consumers. It significantly reduces the need for virgin pulp and saves trees, and what’s more important, another glossy brochure or a bird being able to go home at the end of a hard day’s chirping?

Sustainable Paper Alternatives.

Now, if you really want to ensure your company keeps the Earth’s forests intact, why not try tree-free paper. We know, that sounds a lot like a bitterly disappointing sugar-free dessert but bear with us, it’s made from alternative fibres such as hemp, bamboo, or agricultural residues like sugarcane bagasse. Hemp paper for example is made from the fibres of the hemp plant, which grows quickly and requires fewer pesticides and herbicides compared to traditional paper sources.

Non Petroleum Inks.

If it’s good enough as an alternative milk for your flat white, then it’s good enough for your printing ink too, use soy-based or other eco-friendly inks that are less harmful to the environment compared to traditional petroleum-based inks.

“Sustainable design is about making conscious choices at every stage of the process. From selecting materials to designing for longevity, every decision can contribute to a more sustainable outcome.” – Mae Zamora, Graphic designer, TGM.

Digital Print vs Traditional Off-Set Print.

Opt for digital printing methods that minimise waste. Techniques like on-demand printing ensure that only the necessary quantities are produced, reducing excess waste. It’s fast and should you require more reruns, the setup is minimal and cost effective.

Digital printing allows you to not only produce smaller quantities of materials but the finishes and quality has come a long way since it first revolutionised the print industry in the early 2000’s. Print finishes can turn your marketing from mundane to memorable. Here are some great features you can incorporate into your next digital print job.

Metallic and fluoro digital inks, nothing like a bit of silver and hot pink to make your message stand out, inks continue to be developed and with these new bright colours your messages are sure to catch the eye.

Matt and UV gloss can be applied in spot areas as highlights or across the whole page to provide contrast and highlight logos or imagery, they provide a tactile luxury to an inexpensive print option.

View a sample of our sustainable design projects here

How digital marketing can help you hit your sustainability targets.

How about not printing anything at all? We know that sounds like crazy advice from a design agency but we’re modern folk and if you really want to smash those sustainable KPI’s, go digital.

Digital Marketing gives your company the ability to reach further and more often using a multitude of formats that are both effective and sustainable. This includes email marketing, social media campaigns, digital billboards and brochures, which reduce the need for physical materials. Updates to campaign information are easily made without having to throw away mountains of redundant brochures, flyers or posters.

And here’s a tip we bet you didn’t think about.

Energy-Efficient Websites. Make sure your website loads quickly and use minimal server resources. This not only improves user experience but also reduces energy consumption.
You can ask your developer to write clean, efficient code to reduce server load and improve website speed. This can include minimising the use of heavy scripts and optimising the file size of images. We can guarantee you that most websites have images that haven’t been optimised to web resolution or size and are using more server resources than needed.

Then of course another way to make energy reductions include choosing a web hosting provider that uses renewable energy sources or has carbon offset programs. On top of this, Content Delivery Networks (CDNs) like cloud flare distribute your content more efficiently, reducing load times and server strain.

Sustainability in design is not just a trend; it’s a vital aspect of modern business practices and a strong societal expectation. By incorporating sustainable principles into your print and digital design processes, you can meet your sustainability KPIs while also enhancing your brand’s reputation and operational efficiency.

Next time you have a design or marketing project coming up, make sure it not only hits your sales goals but your sustainability goals as well.

Our team is experienced in creating sustainable design for business, so why not drop us a paperless communication, with well optimised imagery delivered via a CDN and we’ll save the world together, one design at a time. Actually it’s probably more efficient to click the button below – talk soon!