The printer was a participant in the Victorian Employers’ Chamber of Commerce and Industry (VECCI) sustainability program, which claims to have helped participating businesses save an average of $6,600 per year on energy and water costs.
Based in the Melbourne suburb of Notting Hill, Vega got involved with Grow Me The Money as part of the ongoing continual improvement requirements of its ISO 14001 accreditation.
Commercial manager Rob Nugent told ProPrint that the company’s overall Environmental Management System showed that green improvements had a clear business benefit.
“By being more sustainable, you can save money,” said Nugent. “For instance, we’ve reduced material to landfill by 50% – we don’t have to pay a contractor to take it away.”
He added that participating in Grow Me The Money was the latest facet in a green drive that has including a $100,000 spend to replace the company’s 2,000 fluorescent tubes with energy-saving lighting, implement power factor correction, and install SkyCool thermal insulation coating to reduce temperatures across its 5,000sqm factory.
The 115-staff company, which runs a fleet of KBA Rapida and Heidelberg presses, is also FSC-accredited, as well as being certified to ISO 12647-2 in colour management.
Nugent has since become a ‘business sustainability ambassador’ for the Grow Me The Money program, which looks to foster links between small businesses to share environmental knowledge.
“The print industry is so competitive down here and lots of people don’t want to share what they’re doing environmentally.”
“But I became a mentor through the program and offered to take calls from other small companies, not just printers,” he added. “It’s not just about Vega – it’s about sharing information with other people who want to be sustainable.”
According to VECCI, participants in Grow Me The Money are reducing their carbon footprint by an average of 15.4%, or 28 tonnes.
VECCI chief executive Wayne Kayler-Thomson said: “”By undertaking a range of straight-forward sustainability measures, businesses have made large savings of carbon and money.
“Together, the Australian business community can cut targeted emissions by one-third by picking sustainability’s low-hanging fruit,” added Kayler-Thomson.
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