Sustainability at VBS
Shep organizing our certified LEED warehouse!
By Mark Ewald, aka Shep
Here at VT Beer Shepherd we are always trying to improve our process with an eye on sustainability. The environment has always been of big importance to our founders. We have moved into our new warehouse that is a certified LEED, green warehouse. Some of these features include motion sensor lighting, green LED lights, and a super insulated building. We are stoked for this. We have also started an in-office compositing program to keep our foodstuff out of the landfill. All of these little things help us reduce our carbon footprint.
Delivery Driver, Nick, using PalletWrapz to load beer!
Sustainability is something that matters to all of the Shepherds. So much so that we have tasked Shepherd Dan to head up our company sustainability program, as this was his focus in school. One of Shep’s pet peeves was all of the single use stretch wrap that we used to keep our (and then your) products safe on our delivery vehicles. This not only seemed to be a huge waste and a bad use of petroleum, but also a very costly expense that we paid for all the wrap that we used. Dan identified a green solution for this ongoing problem and presented a new product called Pallet Wrapz.
This green product uses mesh and velcro to help keep our products securely on the pallets while eliminating the need for any stretch wrap at all. VBS has invested in a fleet of these for all of our deliveries. We utilize at least 3 of these Wrapz everyday eliminating the waste of 6 stretch wrapped pallets per day. That equals 30 pallets that are not using plastic wrap per week! Most of you will never see these in use but Shep wanted to let everyone know that we are committed to continuing to green our company here in the Green Mountains!