The Imago Group Environmental Policies & Goals

The Imago Group is renowned as a leading international print management company with sales and production offices worldwide.  Imago facilitates and manages the production and delivery of all types of books, stationery, board games, puzzles, and other items and has been serving the publishing industry and other brand owners for over 40 years.

We recognise that it is our responsibility to reduce our negative impact on the environment. We are proactive in our approach to change by developing and supporting environmentally friendly policies and sustainable processes in our workplaces, and use our influence to drive change throughout our supply chain.

The following policies underpin our commitment to reducing our environmental impact

Carbon Policy & Goals

Measuring, reporting, and reducing our direct (Scopes 1 and 2) and indirect (Scope 3) carbon footprint is a key point of focus for Imago.   Our targets are as follows:

  • To reduce our carbon footprint by 25% by 2025
  • To reduce our carbon footprint by 50% by 2030
  • To reach zero carbon by 2050

Scope 1 & 2

Our direct carbon footprint includes the energy we use and purchase to power our offices.  We have already taken significant steps to reduce our emissions by using renewable energy in our US and UK offices.

Scope 3

Our indirect carbon footprint includes the energy used by the printers, paper mills and other producers in our supply chain.   It also includes the energy used to transport the goods we produce and any business travel carried out by our employees.

We are currently embarking on a project with our core suppliers to assess their environmental performance.  This project will look at the energy they use, their recycling of waste and the purchasing of materials. Our aim is to increase awareness and drive change to ensure prompt actions are taken to reduce our industry’s contribution to the climate crisis.

two happy factory workers in paper mill

Our planned actions include:

  • Providing our teams with a dedicated sustainability training session
  • Send out an in-depth carbon and environment questionnaire to printers
  • Create a business and supply chain carbon footprint baseline, for measuring future progress against
  • Create an ongoing discussion with suppliers to urge them to take necessary steps to lower their environmental impact and to improve their readiness by becoming/maintaining FSC accreditation and ISO 14001:2015 Environmental Management
  • To research and encourage our suppliers to invest in cleaner technology such as thermal plate setting and HUV printing technology
  • Create a briefing document for customers to encourage uptake of carbon neutral printing (offsetting) by demonstrating how this can fit into their larger program of carbon reduction
  • To develop a pathway/product carbon profile for clients who want to reduce their carbon footprint and adopt greener production processes
tree rising from a book

Paper Policy & Goals

The most significant aspect of our environmental impact lies in the paper we use, through its carbon footprint (because the papermaking process is very energy intensive) and through its impact on forests.   We recognise that materials which are sustainably sourced have a lower environmental impact.

Sourcing Sustainably

Book Chain Project

Imago is a founding member of The Book Chain Project (BCP). BCP members include many leading publishing companies who work collaboratively to help to drive improvement through the supply chain in the areas of forest sources, labour standards and product safety.

BCP collect, analyse and grade thousands of forest sources / papers based on robust environmental credentials.  They use a three-tier grading system: 1 star, 3 star or 5 star, with 1 star being the worst and 5 star the best.

Imago’s policy is to offer and encourage our clients to use papers which are BCP grade 3 star (Forest source is known and responsible) or grade 5 star (Forest source is recycled or certified as FSC or PEFC).    FSC certification is considered the hallmark of sustainable paper sourcing.

FSC Certification

Imago’s FSC certification enables us to offer clients use of the FSC trademark and to manufacture products according to FSC’s auditable Chain of Custody.   Many of Imago’s clients choose FSC papers for their products and label their products accordingly, others opt to use FSC papers but do not display the trademark.

Imago’s Paper Policy goal is to ensure 100% of our paper is sourced sustainably and from known sources.  To this end we will:

  • Measure the volumes of FSC papers (with/without trademark) in the products we produce and increase our volumes year on year
  • Encourage our clients to use the FSC label on their products if appropriate and in compliance
  • Measure and audit the non FSC paper brands we use to ensure that all paper products are produced using known and responsible sources – Book Chain Project grade 3 and above

Plastic Policy & Goals

As part of our commitment to reducing our carbon footprint, we will take every opportunity to reduce our use of single-use plastics and explore viable alternatives to package or protect the products we make.

This includes looking at innovative and alternative packaging solutions for display packaging.

As part of this drive, our goals are to:

  • measure the volumes of our plastic packaging – including recycled content
  • find packaging plastics, such as shrink wrap and polybags, with a minimum 30% recycled content within 2022
  • to find and offer sustainable alternatives to plastic to our customers. Examples we are working on currently include paper flo-wrap packets instead of plastic for card packs, paper wafer seals and paper based tape for sealing cartons
ocean floor clean blue

Improving Our Own Workplace

We try to create a green, healthy workplace and we look to find ways to reduce our own scope 1 & 2 emissions.

2020-21 UK-based Initiatives Include:

Our Workplace Goals Include