Your company’s ecommerce supply chain may be improved by going green. It doesn’t have to disrupt your entire supply chain.
There are several practical actions you may take to minimize the environmental effect of your ecommerce business (even if it’s small) without sacrificing profitability (and possibly improving it in the long run).
1. Use eco-friendly packaging
Packaging that is excessive or non-recyclable results in a lot of waste. Recycled materials or those that are readily recyclable or compostible make eco-friendly packaging.
ecoEnclose is a company that makes eco-friendly packaging using recyclable and/or compostable cardboard and plastic. Other examples include noissue and Arka, which offer branded bespoke packaging solutions made of environmentally friendly materials.
Consumers are more willing to pay more for sustainable packaging when compared with traditional plastic. With that in mind, investing in environmentally responsible packaging is worth the effort.
2. Eliminate single-use plastics for a more green ecommerce supply chain
Single-use plastics are a major cause of waste, pollution, and climate change. It’s critical to find means to minimize the use of them in your supply chain (and ideally eliminate them entirely).
This might indicate reducing the amount of marketing material that is supplied with every order, or eliminating the act of packaging each item within an order in its own bag.
Many products, such as cosmetics and medicines, have to be packaged individually for safety or hygienic reasons. Instead of using a non-biodegradable bag or one manufactured from recycled materials, consider switching it out for a biodegradable bag or one made from reused materials.
3. Offer carbon offsets for shipping
As we’ve seen, shipping entails carbon emissions that contribute to global warming.
Using a tool like EcoCart, ecommerce supply chain companies may calculate the precise carbon footprint of each purchase and offset it by donating that amount to verified carbon offsetting programs that are currently lowering the quantity of carbon in the atmosphere.
Businesses may either pay for offset on behalf of their clients or allow them to offset at checkout, with the latter being typically 1-2% of the total value.
EcoCart can also assist you in integrating sustainability touch points into your customer journey to ensure that your consumers are aware of the effort.
4. Purchase carbon offsets for the ecommerce supply chain
Carbon offsets are a fantastic way to use them outside your ecommerce company to help it become more sustainable. Even though your business is online, there are still a lot of carbon emissions created by routine delivery operations.
Launch Fulfillment teamed up with Pachama, which allows merchants that outsource fulfillment to Launch Fulfillment to offset their carbon footprint and opt-in for carbon-neutral shipping.
Customers of Launch Fulfillment can use Pachama to analyze shipping emissions, receive monthly reports, and follow progress over time to see how the effect has evolved. Furthermore, Launch Fulfillment offset its own carbon emissions.
Carbonfund evaluates the carbon footprint of various company activities and then offsets them by supporting carbon offsetting initiatives.
When trying to offset carbon emissions, you may want a broad and categorically diverse portfolio of offset projects.
5. Distribute your inventory to reduce shipping distance when possible
Customers are used to receiving their purchases quickly and inexpensively. If you live in California, for example, it’s almost impossible to deliver an order from there to New York in two days via standard shipping, which is not as bad for the environment as air shipping.
Traders using Fulfillment by Amazon can use SellerShip to coordinate the movement of goods among their warehouses and selected fulfillment centers. This allows orders to be fulfilled from the closest fulfillment center to the customer’s end location, which improves last-mile delivery and lowers shipping expenses.
You may meet client expectations while also maintaining a more sustainable shipping solution by implementing an inventory distribution model.