AUTUMN//WINTER 2017 53 HENRI DAVIS finds out how the market is moving away from the bad old days of grey and grainy recycled paper to develop new, long-lasting sustainability strategies SUSTAINABLE STATIONERY DESPITE all the pre-millennium hype about moving to paperless offices, paper sales continue to be strong, be it for A4 refill pads, notebooks or diaries. The ongoing significant use of paper – and products to file it in – means that we should take a responsible approach about the source of raw materials and how we process them, to ensure that wherever possible they are sustainable and therefore available for years to come. Back in the 1990s most ‘environmentally friendly’ stationery products were made from recycled paper, which was usually very grey and often had such an open texture that if you used a rollerball or fountain pen your writing feathered; it was synonymous with poor-quality product. A lot of effort was put into the technology around its recovery and processing to make it much closer in colour, quality and writing experience to a paper made with virgin pulp. This processing was costly and the bleaching of the recycled material was not environmentally friendly. Recycled paper manufacturers could not charge a premium despite additional production costs, yet the paper was expected to perform well. I was working at WHSmith at the time, and every paper range from writing paper to A4 refill pads had to have a recycled paper product due to consumer demand. Roll forward almost 30 years and what has changed? Recycled paper products are still available but they have not become a significant part of the UK market. They remain quite niche, with retailers offering a product option in key areas like copier paper. However, this doesn’t mean the environment has been abandoned but rather that the focus has changed, with FSC and PEFC papers replacing recycled materials in many areas. FSC and PEFC certification both ensure paper comes from a sustainable and legal forest source. The main difference between the two schemes is their approach. In 1995 there was a major global push to encourage paper buyers to commit to purchasing credibly certified wood and wood materials, and in 1998 the first FSC toilet tissue in the world was offered in the UK, by Sainsburys! The FSC logo gained real recognition when supermarkets started to insist on it for sandwich packaging, so now consumers see it everywhere. They may not know exactly what it stands for, but it reassures them that the paper or board is sourced responsibly. In categories like greeting cards it is now the norm for a product to be made using FSC or recycled materials, and Glebe Cottage has been at the forefront of environmentally sensitive production since the mid 90s. Its notecard wallets contain eight small cards and envelopes. As well as being printed on 100% recycled board, any designs that benefit from strong colour are laminated with a high-gloss compostable laminate made from cornstarch so the product can still be recycled. If it used a normal laminate the plastic would render the paper unrecyclable. Stewart Superior Glebe Cottage STATIONERY BIZ