Safelincs takes an eco-friendly approach!

Eighteen months ago, Safelincs moved its premises to a seven-acre site on West Street, formerly occupied by the engineering companies CS Martin, Finnveden and Gnutti.

Since then, managing director Harry Dewick-Eisele, who started the company as a sole trader in 2001, has devoted much of his time to reducing the environmental impact of its operations.

A bird’s eye view of the building reveals that much of the roof above the warehouse space is now covered by 1,000 square metres of solar panels, while inside the offices and warehouse space, all fluorescent and sodium lights have been replaced with LED energy saving lights which last three times as long as a fluorescent lights and only use a third of the electricity.

Safelincs, who recently won the Best Employer and Customer Services awards at the East Lindsey District Council Business Awards, has grown to operate the UK’s largest online fire safety portal - offering more than 6,000 products and fire safety services.

Mr Dewick-Eisele said: “Innovation has always been key to Safelincs’ growth.

“We are now looking closely at the products we sell to see how they, or their packaging, can be developed to be more environmentally friendly.”

The company recently won a contract to supply and distribute over 150,000 individual smoke/carbon monoxide alarms to locations around the world. Working with the manufacturer, it has eliminated all plastic packaging and replaced it with recyclable cardboard.

Safelincs sells over 100 different types of fire extinguisher. Padding for transit originally constructed from polystyrene is now also made from cardboard. In addition, one of its key suppliers, Kidde, now provides its products packaged in cardboard that is devoid of coloured ink.

Mr Dewick-Eisele continued: “Like many other organisations, we are finding that our changes not only benefit the environment, but they make good business sense as well. The changes to packaging and the solar PV installation are saving us money.”

The 60-strong staff are actively involved in contributing ideas to reduce the company’s environmental footprint.

Through the company’s suggestion scheme, staff put forward the idea of electric hand driers to take advantage of the electricity the company produces from the solar panels and to eliminate the waste of one-use paper hand towels.

All chocolates provided to team members on site are now palm oil-free, and plastic-free tea bags are available for staff and visitors.

All teas and coffees are certified by organisations such as the Rainforest Alliance.