Ringtons Sustainability
The founder of the business in 1907, Samuel Smith, always did his best ‘to do the right thing’, with particular focus on his customers, his staff and the quality of the Ringtons products. All of us at Ringtons today maintain this belief in ‘doing the right thing’. We also have another fundamental belief from our founder ‘actions speak louder than words’.
As a family business well over 100 years old now moving into the 5th generation, we would like to share with you our sustainability story so far and our plans for the future as we aim to continually reduce our footprint on the planet.
Simon M Smith
CEO, 4th Generation Family Member
We hope you enjoy reading what we have been doing, if you have any questions please get in touch
Email: tea@ringtons.co.uk
Call: 0800 052 2440
Our journey so far
Here at Ringtons, we're committed to working smarter and reducing our environmental impact. We care about the challenges faced at home and around the world and that’s why we’ve been working with partners across the globe to do what we can to minimise our environmental impact, source sustainably and champion brilliant projects near and far.
Here are some of the projects we've been working on:
Electric vans
In 2020 we welcomed our first electric vehicle to our doorstep delivery fleet and are really excited to welcome more over the coming years, marking a new era in the history of Ringtons transport. We won't be buying any diesel vehicles beyond 2030 but believe the switch to electric will happen much sooner than that as the countries electric infrastructure continues to strengthen and our processes accelerate. Rest assured, we're aiming to complete the transition of over 230 vans as quickly as possible and will keep you updated!
Tea bag paper
The majority of our tea bags are sealed using a plant-based plastic, it's a renewable, sustainable material.
Tea packaging
To tackle waste, we're significantly reducing our tea packaging. We're currently converting our 100 tea bag packets to two 50 packs, getting rid of the outer wrapper. This helps cut down on waste by 12 tonnes per year and ensures the tea you buy from us is fresh, full of flavour and ultimately, the true taste of tea.
Green energy
Our offices are all powered by 100% renewable energy that is generated here in Britain from sun, wind, water and bioenergy. This switch has reduced our CO2 emissions by 200 tonnes. By fitting modern energy-saving LED units at Ringtons HQ we save an additional 8 tonnes of carbon per year too.
Carbon neutrality
In June 2021 we were assessed against the Carbon Footprint Standard by a third party and are certified Carbon Neutral for scopes 1 and 2. Our scope 1 and 2 emissions represent a CO2 equivalent of 1,741 tonnes for the latest financial year. We have chosen to offset these emissions by supporting projects in Kenya and Brazil. We commit to reassessment every year, with a view to including our scope 3 emissions too. We know that simply offsetting is not the long-term solution, and this is the start of our “carbon journey”. We will appraise all recommendations made and aim to reduce our emissions year on year.
We helped plant over 1,000 native trees in Kenya's Great Rift Valley through our offsetting scheme with Carbon Footprint.
Community: Working together
Caring for our communities near and far is something we are and always will be committed to. In 2019 we set up an Environmental Charitable Trust, with the aim of supporting projects that promote the benefit of the public conservation, protection and improvement of the physical and natural environment through the provision of financial grants. Current benefactors include the Northumberland Wildlife Trust.
Here are just some of the organisations we are a part of:
Ethical Tea Partnership
We’re active members of The Ethical Tea partnership. Together, with 50 other organisations, we aim to create a fairer, more sustainable tea industry for workers, farmers and the environment. By buying Ringtons, you're supporting tea communities and farmers across Africa and Asia through our partnership with ETP.
World Coffee Research
We are proud to contribute to World Coffee Research's check off programme, helping to support their aim of growing, protecting, and enhancing supplies of quality coffee around the world while improving the livelihoods of the families who produce it.
Tyne & Wear Community Foundation
We are one of the founding members of The Tyne and Wear Community Foundation helping communities thrive across the North East England. Since 1988 the foundation has been working towards changing lives and helping everyone feel they belong.
Tea Growing Community Charitable Trust
Founded in 2013, our own Tea Growing Community Charitable Trust makes grants to organisations tackling issues that affect smallholder farmers and workers in the tea industry across the world. One example includes giving Malawian smallholders access to solar lighting products via the provision of interest free loans to fund the upfront costs.
Plans for the future
As a family business, our future is as important to us as our past; that's why we will continue to reduce our footprint every year, doing all that we can to play our part in a more sustainable future for tea, coffee and the wider community. Here are just some of our future plans, but we'll keep you updated on our sustainability journey!
Electric vans
We're committed to converting our fleet to electric and will no longer purchase diesel vehicles from 2030.
Tea packaging
Our 100s teabag packaging will all be converted to 50s by the end of 2022, early 2023.
Charitable giving
Our aim is to increase our total charitable endowments to £5m by 2024.
Continuous improvement
We're making many small changes to make the products you buy from us, and our services more sustainable.
Packaging
We want to reduce our impact on the world and reviewing our packaging is key to this! We are reviewing all packaging items used, looking where they can be reduced or replaced with a material that has a proven and accessible recycling route. Our packaging must remain fit for purpose – for our tea it is key that we can maintain the tea’s freshness with our Leaf Lock technology, ensuring you enjoy the true taste of tea. This is why our tea is packed into foil sachets. We are keeping a very close eye on new emerging materials and technologies with the aim of finding a recyclable alternative to our current foil sachets.
