The team members at Adelaide Bricks4Kidz have always felt strongly about recycling and the concept of Zero Waste. So much so that team members often refuse to throw out their rubbish, leaving their plastic bags in a pile near the bins, stock piling our used batteries and leaving their half eaten pasties in the sink. But these great environmental initiatives have left management with a few headaches to deal with such as unsightly mountains of bags-of-bags-of-bags, fire hazards from potentially exploding batteries and a phenomena known as a smelly kitchen.
It has become clear that our workplace isn’t even environmentally sustainable for the next year let alone the next 100, so we’ve decided to take action as a company and write down a plan plan of action ! A summary of our first draft is below and we invite comments, suggestions and improvements!
Adopting the zero waste attitude was a bricks-4-brainer for us. Ee Wen, one of our directors has always been a keen advocate of the concept so we are guided by these principles.
Our next step is to identify the main items we throw out as well as the main items we buy and then figure out how we can reduce this or at least minimise the impact on the environment by re-using, recycling or changing our purchasing habits.
Things we throw out
- Batteries
- Paper
- Cardboard
- Soft Plastics
Things we buy
- Lego / Duplo
- Technics
- Batteries
- Party Bags
- Layards
Batteries
This came up in both the list of things we buy and the things we throw out the most it was a bricks-4-brains decision to try and tackle this issue first.
As of July 2021 budget of around $1500 has been allocated to research and purchase a rechargeable battery solution that provides optimises economic and environmental outcomes. More details of the progress of this can be found in the post: https://www.bricks4kidz.com.au/north-adelaide-norwood/our-junior-robotics-workshops-are-bad-for-the-environment/
Lego/Duplo/Technics
As a rapidly expanding company, we need to buy lots of Lego, Duplo and Technics to ensure we have enough kits to take to our growing list of services such as birthday parties, OSHC Incursions, school science incursions and spectacular festivals and events.
While Lego have announced that its famous bricks will be made from 100% recycled plastic by 2030, Adelaide Bricks4Kidz has appointed our warehouse manager, Yvonne Burford to be in charge of transitioning all sourcing all Lego/Duplo and Technic from local South Australian based recycled Lego dealers whereever possible. You can read more about Yvonne and her work here:
Lego/Duplo/Technics
This came up in both the list of things we buy and the things we throw out the most it was a bricks-4-brains decision to try and tackle this issue first.
As of July 2021 budget of around $1500 has been allocated to research and purchase a rechargeable battery solution that provides optimises economic and environmental outcomes. More details of the progress of this can be found in the post: https://www.bricks4kidz.com.au/north-adelaide-norwood/our-junior-robotics-workshops-are-bad-for-the-environment/