&Open’s Environmental Impact Report and sustainable gifting roadmap: From seed to success
Discover our commitment to responsible practices and a greener future.
Deep dive into our categories
There are countless environmental crises taking center stage in global conversations. Born from the many critical issues threatening our planet, it has become increasingly evident that each one of us has a role to play. At &Open, we wholeheartedly embrace our responsibility to be a part of the solution by incorporating sustainability into everything we do.
As a company built on human connection, we understand that, fundamentally, these connections begin with our unified home - the Earth. So, we are excited to share our first Impact Report. This report highlights our commitment to sustainable gifting and serves as an essential milestone on our journey toward safeguarding the planet for future generations.
Join us as we dive into the important aspects of this report and how it affirms our commitment to protecting the environment.
Fill out the form below to read the full report:
Making promises and setting goals
We envision a world where businesses prioritize the well-being of our planet and its inhabitants in every decision they make. That's the world we're actively sculpting at &Open. In 2021 we established three core pillars that guide our environmental efforts and social responsibility. With these foundational commitments, we set out defined objectives that we're determined to achieve.
Pillar 1: Gift considerately
We promise to gift considerately. We meticulously source from suppliers prioritizing sustainability, recyclability, social justice, and more - ranking highly in our responsibility attributes.
We've hit the halfway mark, with 51% of suppliers in our gifting portfolio having at least one responsibility attribute. Our ambitions are even higher for the end of 2023 as we aim for 70% of our gifting portfolio to feature at least one responsibility attribute.
Pillar 2: Tread lightly
We vow to tread lightly. We recognize the impact of bulky packaging and high shipping costs on the environment. We are actively improving these things. Collaborating with logistics partners, we continuously refine our shipping and packaging methods to minimize our carbon footprint. Our ultimate goal is to achieve net zero emissions.
Don't worry; our endeavors won't compromise your business gifting needs. We are fully committed to rolling out carbon-neutral shipping and sustainable packaging choices for all our clients.
Pillar 3: Inspire with impact
Last but not least, we aim to inspire with impact. With us, gifting isn't just a token of appreciation—it's an opportunity to create a positive ripple effect in our society and the broader environment. We've interwoven cause gifting into our platform.
In 2021 and 2022, our customers contributed €151,536 to organizations committed to improving the world.
Our 4-step process for selecting suppliers
As part of our promise to gift considerably, our suppliers must meet responsibility attributes, like sustainability, recyclability, and social justice. To ensure our suppliers meet the requirements, we have a rigid 4-step selection process.
Step 1:
This journey begins with the key to care, our compass for identifying suppliers who share our vision for change. We greatly admire those who utilize their businesses as a vehicle for positive change, whether through amplifying marginalized voices, environmental advocacy, cultural preservation, or fighting against animal cruelty.
Step 2:
Our second step involves a deep dive into potential business partners; we leave no stone unturned. We're looking for integrity and transparency.
Step 3:
We examine the responsibility attributes of a gift and suppliers. This allows us to carefully curate gifts that not bring joy but align with our core values.
Step 4:
The final decider is a supplier questionnaire to understand their sustainability
Download our Impact Report to learn how suppliers like Aesop, Ocean Bottle, Everybody.World and others met our selection criteria.
Our journey to net zero
At &Open, we are thoughtfully engaging with everyone—internal teams, external partners, and, importantly, our valued clients—to strive to shrink our carbon footprint significantly. Our mission by the end of 2023 is to achieve at least a 10% cut in emissions compared to 2021, our baseline year. Additionally, we aim to be net zero before 2050.
Here is our plan for achieving this:
- We're increasing local sourcing by 10%. Not only does this slash our supply chain’s carbon emissions, but it also supports hard-working local communities. For 2022, our data shows that, on average, a gift shipped via On-Demand has a logistical footprint of 0.686 kg CO2e, roughly 80% smaller than the average gift sent via our enterprise business.
- An eco-friendly fuel alternative will soon replace the fossil-fuelled heating system at our Dublin office and warehouse.
- We want to replace air freight with sea, rail, or road transport.
- We’re moving to 100% recycled and recyclable packaging.
- Our new waste reduction program, armed with ambitious targets for the next two years, is raring to go.
- An expanded range of digital gifts and cause gifts. They’re eco-friendly, instant, and make the world a better place.
- We are saying a fond farewell to our Australian warehouse. We expect this will result in an impressive 10-20% shrinkage in our overall carbon emissions.
Innovating for a sustainable future
At &Open, we’ve always been conscious of our social and environmental impact within an industry as historically wasteful as corporate gifting. Throughout our sustainability journey, we’ve worked with best-in-class organizations and agencies to help shape a more responsible future for &Open.
This being said, we’re proud to introduce our latest gift category - Carbon offsets via our partnership with Patch — a company that makes it easier than ever for &Open clients to give back to the planet by gifting ethical carbon offsets.
Patch is a tech platform set out to make meaningful climate action an agenda item for all kinds of businesses, regardless of size. Our partnership with Patch allows our clients access to carefully vetted climate action projects across six continents. This enables our clients to contribute towards vetted and trustworthy climate impact projects allowing them to scale their solutions to the speed our planet needs.
We’re thrilled to have the opportunity to support projects like this. They not only inspire carbon-conscious efforts on behalf of our clients but use the act of gifting to directly tackle one of the most urgent challenges of our era: Climate change. While there’s still a lot to be done, our goal is to keep taking action toward a more sustainable future, and we’re happy to say that this partnership marks one more collective step in the right direction.
Curious about our ambitious environmental goals? Download our full Impact Report through the form below.
Fill out the form below to read the full report:
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