The bubble wrap supply in the shop has almost run out.
So what?
Well, for us it’s a good thing because our next order will consist of bio-degradable bubble wrap. It’s slightly more expensive but we think it’s worth it.
Why?
Because the world’s resources are not infinite and we need to make sure there is a future for our children, their children and their children etc. By safeguarding our planet in the present moment, we can give them a future.
Why use it at all?
Wrapping our completed frame orders in bubble wrap is the best way of protecting them and we can’t find a better alternative. (If anyone has another idea, please let us know).
Balancing act
At Fish Frames, we try to do as much as we can to be kind to our environment whilst still maintaining a viable business, which can be quite a balancing act. So, here is what we do:
- Recycle our glass waste – we have to pay our supplier to take this away and recycle for us. For some reason, the Council say that the glass we use has too much lead in it so they can’t recycle it. General consensus of opinion amongst fellow framers and suppliers is that this is nonsense. So we pay someone else to take it.
- Recycle our waste board and paper products – everything comes wrapped in cardboard, and there is waste from our mountboard and backing boards, so it is all recycled. Again, we have to pay extra for this facility.
- Recycle all our tubes, tape innards, etc. We keep all the ‘round things’ and give them to local schools to use in their art and craft classes.
- The wood for our mouldings is from sustainable sources, as far as possible, and a lot of our suppliers are now FSC (Forest Stewardship Council) registered, which is good news for all.
- Use bio-degradable bubble wrap, which funnily enough, is green-coloured!
- Use low-voltage, LED lights in the gallery
On a personal note, I also try to walk to work as much as possible, so I am not using the car so much, which means less petrol usage, less wear and tear on the car and a fitter, healthier me!
Green living at home
We also recycle at home – all cardboard and paper, glass and plastic, plastic carrier bags, compost of raw food and food waste for cooked food. I think the food waste is a great idea – landfill is becoming a real problem and anything sensible which can reduce the problem is a good thing. I am also in the process of amassing cloth bags so I don’t have to use plastic carrier bags at all. They stopped issuing them in the Republic of Ireland some years ago, and I think it would be a good thing if we did it here too.
The trouble with plastic
My personal bugbear is plastic (hence the glee about the bio degradable bubble wrap) – and I know that there is an awful lot of it on this planet which is incredibly useful (bubble wrap) and we cannot do without it now, BUT, every single piece of plastic that has ever been made on this earth is still here. It doesn’t degrade but breaks down into the tiniest pieces which usually end up in our oceans, which the fish eat, and then we eat the fish so we have tiny pieces of plastic inside us. Steps are being taken to resolve this problem, for example, recently, an Italian company called Minerv, was awarded certification for the first 100% biodegradable plastic produced from sugar cane.
David de Rothschild, founder of the Plastiki expedition, in an interview for The Guardian, put it best, in my opinion:
We have two types of plastic now,” he says. “First, dumb, single-use plastic bags and plastic bottles. We need to eliminate them, phase them out, tax them out of existence. And then we need to invest in the second kind of plastics that we can reduce, reuse and recycle, that we can use in computers and in life-saving machinery and everything else. If we can build a boat that can sail across the Pacific made of this stuff, why can’t we make a skateboard or a bike helmet with it?”
Couldn’t have put it better myself!
Picture: www.anorak.co.uk