5 Simple and Effective Ways of Making Your E-Commerce Business More Eco-Friendly

As more and more consumers worldwide change their buying habits and expect companies to practice greener, more eco-friendly business models , how businesses operate is changing. Not only are companies more reliant upon modern technology, but they’re also becoming increasingly environmentally friendly in the process.

Initially, the reason why e-commerce business models proved so successful was largely due to their convenience. With just a few clicks, customers could order a variety of products and services and have them delivered straight to their door, all from the comfort of their own home. Today however, consumers are less concerned about convenience, and more concerned about the environment.

Industry experts believe that the future success of E-commerce lies in its sustainability . Subsequently, more and more e-commerce businesses are finding ways of becoming greener and more environmentally friendly.

If you operate an e-commerce business and want to make it more sustainable, the following should prove very useful. Here’s a look at several simple and effective ways of making your e-commerce business more eco-friendly.

Overhaul Your Shipping Strategies

One of the easiest ways of making your business more sustainable is by giving your shipping strategies a complete overhaul.

By optimizing the ways in which your products are delivered to your customers, you can significantly reduce your company’s carbon footprint. For example, try to find ways of making fewer journeys by optimizing routes and orders to reduce fuel consumption and emissions.

As well as the above, try to use couriers and delivery companies that have a reputation for being more eco-friendly. For example, you could perhaps go with a delivery firm with a fleet of electric vehicles, or one which practices carbon offsetting.

Make Your Business Greener

Another great way of making your e-commerce business more eco-friendly is by using green products and practices in your daily operations.

In your warehouse for example, you could switch to LED lighting as this is not only more environmentally friendly and energy efficient, it’s also more economical as well. You could use products and machinery with high energy efficiency ratings and switch to more sustainable packaging materials such as aluminum instead of plastic (more on that later).

Go With a Stricter Returns Policy

To some, this may sound fairly controversial, but another great way of making your e-commerce business more eco-friendly is by making it tougher for customers to return products.

While some businesses offer free returns, the simple fact is that customers sometimes abuse these privileges and have been known to return products for no reason, or over the tiniest of issues.

Each time a return is processed a great deal of energy is required and it means another vehicle on the road putting out more emissions when it really isn’t necessary. Not only that, but the heavier each return is, the more fuel will be used during transportation, and the more CO2 will be released into the atmosphere.

To help make your business greener, make it tougher and more expensive for customers to return products to you. Of course, you will still need to operate a returns system but try not to make it too easy. While some customers may not exactly be thrilled with this, try to explain clearly why you’re doing so and how it helps the planet.

Reduce Your Packaging

If your business sells products, they will almost certainly need to be packaged in some way, so as to protect and preserve the product and ensure it reaches the customer in one piece.

Packaging is an essential part of virtually all e-commerce businesses, but excess packaging is simply a waste of energy and resources.

Instead of packaging different items individually, try to find ways of grouping them together in one order and one package. Rather than rolls of plastic bubble wrap, use cardboard bubble wrap instead. Not only is cardboard bubble wrap far, far better for the environment, it’s also thicker than plastic which means that you need less.

Basically, try to find ways of effectively delivering your products using less packaging.

Use Sustainable Packaging

Finally, because of the many environmental dangers of plastic pollution, e-commerce businesses looking to be greener are dropping plastic packaging entirely and opting for more sustainable packaging materials instead.

Rather than plastic, which is toxic, doesn’t fully break down, and is not very recyclable, try to find a material that is non-toxic, better for the environment, more energy efficient, and more recyclable. Paper, cardboard, and glass are all great alternatives to plastic, though they do have their drawbacks. Glass for example, is heavier in weight which can increase emissions during transportation. A material that is becoming increasingly popular for packaging, however, is aluminum.

Aluminum is very strong and offers a number of protective and preservative properties, despite being incredibly lightweight. It is also one of the most widely recycled materials on the planet, and can be recycled over and over again with no loss in quality whatsoever. As if that wasn’t enough, recycling aluminum utilizes 95% less energy than producing it from new.