Whilst we source products from a variety of areas across the globe, we are mindful of our overall impact on carbon footprint and to limit this as much as we possibly can.

We’ve identified some areas below, as examples of where we’ve considered our operational behaviour & the overall effect on the environment:
Manufacturing within the UK - (Read more about our Partnership With The Design Group & £1M Investment) Towards the end of 2017 we invested in paper twisted handle carrier bag machinery in Ystrad Mynach, Wales. The investment came about because of retailers looking for alternatives to plastic carrier bags & wanting to switch to paper bags.

The ability to produce up to 50m of these paper bags with speciality finishes per year allows for us to limit our overall carbon footprint especially within our largest market – the domestic market. At least 75% of our overall sales are within the U.K. The working partnership will continue to invest and increase capacity.

Direct-to-store from Asia: Most of our handmade packaging is manufactured in the Far East & China and whilst we would import many of these products to the U.K. and Europe, some are sent direct to those clients with stores located in Asia. For example, Hugo Boss has over 50 stores alone in China, so having the ability to transport the goods from our Asian manufacturing facilities considerably reduces carbon footprint and additionally shortens the lead time for the customer.

Direct-to-store from Germany: Similarly, several clients (such as the likes of JD Sports & Superdry) have many locations throughout central Europe and it accommodates both us and benefits the environment to despatch these goods from our European warehouse facility in Mainaschaff, Germany.

Transport methods: Generally shipping goods is drastically greener than importing goods via air freight. Reports suggest that air freight produces 44 times more CO2 emissions than shipping for any given journey. CCS McLays urges clients to avoid placing orders that are on extremely tight lead times, because of the adverse environmental effects transporting goods via air freight. We understand that there can be unforeseen spikes in product demand during certain times of the year and therefore there is sometimes no suitable alternative.

It is CCS McLays’ responsibility to identify any product SKUs that are increasing in demand unpredictably and to inform the customer at the first instance of this – to avoid placing orders with air freight.