2020 Responsible Purchasing Update

Our policies limit purchases of beverages in plastic bottles: we don’t order them for in-house meetings or stock them in vending machines. Many of our offices provide reusable tableware for employee meals.

Of course, the best way to reduce our carbon footprint is to consume less. That’s why our sustainable operations guidelines encourage all offices to seek additional ways to use fewer supplies and resources. For example, consolidating supply orders lowers delivery-related transportation emissions and reduces packaging materials used by suppliers.

Printer paper is our second most used office supply, after food and other break-room supplies. Our sustainable operations guidelines specifically address paper-use reduction in several ways. They recommend using 100 percent post-consumer recycled paper, using electronic documents whenever possible, and printing double-sided when hard copies are needed. Sixty-six percent of the paper products we purchased from Staples in 2020 were classified as having advanced eco-features.