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Environmental Sustainability:
We need to do better
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At Alive & Kicking, we’re all about transparency. We need you to hold us accountable: that’s why we track our social impact right here on our website. We strive for transparency, accountability, and collaboration throughout our chain of production and distribution, with an on-the-ground committee calling the shots in every country we make or sell our balls in. We’re proud of having grown a company that produces high-quality footballs and does good in the world. But we know we can always improve; and we’re starting to think harder about our environmental impact.
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You’ve probably seen things like 100% recycled products, compostable packaging, plant-a-tree programs and carbon footprint calculators.
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We’ve done a few of these ourselves, with some really exciting and innovative ball upcycling programmes using everything from airplane seats to our own maize shipping sacks. Our footballs are also already more sustainable than most because they’re so durable and can be patched and repaired, which produces significantly less carbon emissions and waste than manufacturing, packaging and shipping an entire new ball.
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But as we all become aware of the urgency of the climate situation and the role businesses play in this, we know we need to make more permanent, long-term changes to the way we work.
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We also know we need to do this without sacrificing the quality and durability of our products or the social impact of our manufacturing centres and wider charity initiatives. Any tenable progress towards sustainability must be holistic, including ethical social sustainability (as seen from the UN Sustainable Development Goals, of which we have thus far prioritised SDGs 1, 3, 8, and 10).
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What are we doing now?
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- We’ve already started doing our best to ship orders from our production centres to points of distribution in bulk and by sea; and we’re hoping to begin offsetting what carbon emissions we still produce.
- We’re using more recycled packaging and we hope some day – as sustainable material engineering improves all the time – we’ll find a suitable, sustainable material for the balls themselves.
- We’re thinking about how we might be able to reuse and recycle balls productively and our goal is to be actively working towards SDGs 12 and 13 and reporting on our environmental impact by 2023.
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Ultimately, no company can be 100% sustainable all the time; but every company needs to consistently work towards it, and that’s what we’re promising.
In the meantime, let us know if you think there’s something you think we could be doing better, look after your kit and recycle or compost the packaging if you can, and keep playing football!
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