News
BPIF condemns Sainsbury's for shunning print
BPIF chief executive Michael Johnson has accused Sainsbury's of "pulling the wool over our eyes" following a decision to e-mail out its annual shareholders' report.
Sainbury's this year shunned print by sending its 120,000 shareholders an electronic version of the report, it said, as part of its "respect for our environment" campaign.
However, in a letter to the Financial Times, Johnson said: "Instead of trying something new, the company has tried to pull the wool over our eyes.
"The paper industry is one of the great success stories of modern recycling. Paper is not the enemy of the environment it is made out to be."
He added that the electronic report, which most readers will print on a power-sapping office printer, probably on one-sided paper, was a "phoney" attempt to hide a cost-cutting exercise.
A spokeswoman for Sainsbury's said: "It is certainly not our intention to inconvenience our shareholders: last year, they overwhelmingly approved proposals to take advantage of the new rules on the way we communicate with them.
"This year we have a full-colour illustrated review online at our corporate website and we believe this is a change for the better and is in keeping with our corporate responsibility principle of 'respect for our environment'."
This year Sainsbury's emailed its annual shareholders' report
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Comments
rob valley - 02 September 2008
I agree with Sainsbury's on this one. Companies can't continue sending out massive shareholder reports like this. I get one from the company that I'm invested in every year - it's 200 pages long. I own a tiny fraction of one percent of the company. When I get my copy, it goes straight into the recycling bin. Why not just send me a letter to ask me to view it on the internet, with an OPTION to request a printed copy???
In the case of Sainsbury's, how many of their investors bother to read the report???
This sort of excessive printing must stop.
Simon Biltcliffe- Webmart - 02 September 2008
I think Michael has to be careful not to appear to be a Luddite in these matters.
Clearly Sainsbury's are doing it to save money with the environment being a secondary beneficiary, but the age mass mailed report and accounts on this scale must be coming to an end, as most recipients are not very interested in receiving it in this paper based format, and they see it as a wasteful PR exercise by their (usually underperforming) investment. Therefore defending this can seem out of step with the real world.
His other point of defending the paper industry is an entirely valid one and getting coverage in the Financial Times for this point is laudable. It's just that the two issues should not be mixed.
Simon Biltcliffe
MD
WEBMART
www.FreePrintSales.com
Free sales for your presses
Mick Hart - 02 September 2008
I think it about time that someone started to market our industry in its true light, that is, of an environmentally friendly media choice, which it is. Unfortunately our ‘leaders’ (the BPIF being one) have failed dismally over the years in doing so, as this article suggests, and reports which ‘condemn’ and accuse one of our industry’s larger customers in this way are unhelpful in the least – do we really think that talking about our customers in this way in public is good for business?
It is not good that individual companies are seen to be bearing the environment flag alone, as this simply casts the rest, of which is a very well behaved industry generally, into doubt. The organisations which represent our industry at a public level (BPIF, IPIA, DMA, PrintWeek etc) need to be marketing our industry as a whole, in a good environmental light, educating the public and nurturing a supportive market for our products – simply stabbing out at large clients who don’t conform with our wishes is, in my opinion, completely self destroying, and frankly, stupid.
Andrew Tribute - 02 September 2008
The points in the the above comments are very valid. I applaud Michael for standing up for the environmental aspect of the industry but to choose report and accounts as a target is not a good choice. I have saying for years now that report and accounts are a natural for electronic distribution. The few people that really take notice of these figures, namely the analysts and investment managers receive the information electronically and to print a report and accounts is more a PR than an information exercise. I certainly agree with Michael's message about the wastage of electricity in home and office printing and I look forward to hearing more from BPIF in pushing the positive aspects of the paper and printing industries.
Matthew Parker - 02 September 2008
I would be very interested if the BPIF were undertake a study of the environmental footprint of various items of print versus the equivalent internet alternatives. Certainly the only study that I have heard of shows that the carbon footprint for a B2B magazine of 15k circulation is not too far behind that of the associated website. If one takes full lifecycle footprint then I suspect that the environmental story of the internet is wiped out.
Matthew Parker
www.printandprocurement.com
wolf maluchha - 02 September 2008
Suspect Royal Mail costs may be a factor here.
Matt Whipp - 03 September 2008
I think the writing is on the wall for printed company reports when print giant RR Donnelley is working with EDGAR online on a format to publish company filings in a way that the information contained can be directly compared with other reports. Now, it's not just "cheaper" to publish these reports electronically, it makes the information more useful.
The standard involved is called XBRL if you want to look it up. Still, it's worth noting that RR Donnelley's current outlook is that it will complement rather than replace the printed report - there will always be people that prefer to get the information off paper.
Bob Toal - 03 September 2008
In no way can it be argued that Michael Johnson was trying to suggest that printing large reports or documents should be defended. Rather, his letter was picking up on Sainsbury’s false premise that they were doing all this to save the planet. The other objective of the letter was to highlight paper as ‘the success story of recycling’. This untold story was certainly brought to public attention, as the lead letter in the FT.
That message needs to be spread with real vigour. I don’t think the BPIF needs to bow to the all powerful supermarket chain simply to maintain some sort of diplomatic decorum just because they buy large quantities of print. The very role of a trade association is to challenge misrepresentation, especially when it impacts on our members. Pretending that their online reports was environmentally sound was false. They did it to save money. As a trade association, we did it to bring that to your attention and the public at large. Job done.
kathy woodward kathy woodward - 04 September 2008
I think it is great that the BPIF wants to promote greater environmental understanding.... click on their web site under the heading environment.....ah it appears they only want to save the planet if you pay to join the club!
Maybe people in glass houses shouldnt throw stones.... never was a fan of gun boat diplomacy!
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