Every Little Helps | Ethical Business Practices

One of the reasons I set up my own business is that I wanted to do things a bit differently. Too many businesses purport to have ethical business practices or be socially conscious on their websites, and even donate to charities and champion socially conscious causes, but, when it comes down to the details, forget all little things they do each day which add to climate change or fund unethical businesses.

I’ve tried not to do that, I’ve tried where possible, to consider where I spend my [hard earned] money to reduce my impact on the world.

Admittedly I do have a rather gas-guzzling sports car (but use greener petrol and drive carbon neutral where possible), but it’s kept for weekend use. I work a lot remotely and if I need to travel distances, where possible, I will go by train or hire a greener car.

Here’s some of the little things I have done to try to make a small but positive impact on our world:

• Personally, I help sponsor talented children through school and university via the wonderful Ethiopian Education Foundation. My first student, Betsy, has recently graduated from the University of Addis Ababa with an honours degree in Engineering. I also volunteered with Digital Marketing Advice in the early days. although those guys seem to have it all in hand now and have recently expanded the charity to one of the most deprived areas of Ethiopia. If you would like more information on sponsoring a child in Ethiopia, please do get in touch.

• Through Justine Wyness [un]Limited, I donate monthly to WaterAid as I believe clean water should be a basic human right. Whilst we in the more developed world are choking our oceans with the plastic bottles our “mineral” water comes in, many areas of the world don’t even have access to clean water.

• I am also a member of Ocean Conservancy (thanks to a very kind ‘Pay It Forward’ donation), and Surfers Against Sewage. I’m a Marine Conservation Society Beachwatcher and a Big Blue Ocean Cleanup Ambassador. Suffice to say I love the ocean and really hate plastic!

• In the office, I use reusable batteries. I chose Phillips as The Ethical Consumer gave them the best rating for their conflict minerals policy. The Full Guide is summarised well by Sublime Magazine.

• And I gave up using paper pads, turning instead to an Apple Pencil and iPad.

• Wherever possible I buy from brand direct, not from Amazon. It might be convenient but its putting small businesses out of business. For more reasons to #boycottamazon, check out Ethical Consumer’s Boycott Amazon campaign.

• My business cards are made, by Vegetarian Society Vegan Approved company, Hatch. All paper used by Hatch is from recycled and sustainable sources and their ink, toner and adhesives are all vegan. My business cards are packed full of living seeds. You can plant them and grow fuel for Bees!

• And last, but definitely not least, Justine Wyness [un]Limited is a Climate Positive Workforce through the rather brilliant Offset Earth. This means that:

  • Every month my donation goes to planting groves of trees in my company forest and finances carbon reduction projects from around the world.

  • My entire carbon footprint, including emissions from home, personal travel, holidays, food, hobbies and more are offset.

  • All my business travel is offset.

  • I add an extra 100 trees for each new client I take on (I’ll send you a link to yours so you can see the type of tree, the project and the forest on a map!).

  Here’s where I’ve got to so far:

If you would like more information on any of these initiatives, please do get in touch.