Carbon Creative’s Tree Planting Pledge

What did your organisation do to deliver social value?

At Carbon, we believe in sustainable and ethical business and it is something we are very passionate about. We are fully committed to carbon reduction. It’s in our name, it’s in our DNA. More than that though, we want to have a positive effect on our local environment and consequently the communities that benefit from this.

In 2006 we set about thinking of ways to do this and our mission began to start planting trees. The easy route for this would of been to pay a carbon offsetting company to plant trees in exotic locations. The problem was it didn’t feel right, we wanted to see tangible results; to roll up our sleeves, dig and help plant the trees and have the pleasure of seeing them enhance the local urban spaces around us.

With the assistance of local rangers, we started a tree planting scheme in our home city of Salford. A tree is planted for every client project in managed local green spaces and schools, helping to reduce our carbon footprint and improve air quality and biodiversity.
Staff, local community groups, schools and even clients have got involved and helped with the planting of all our trees. The scheme has grown, including supporting local fruit orchards, and to date we have planted 13,302 trees!

National Tree Week

One recent example was National Tree Week in November 2018, and perhaps the best way to tell the story is through the eyes of one of our staff members Rebecca Flint who attended the day, rolled up her sleeves and dug in, here’s Bex’s account:

On National Tree Week we got together with City of Trees and MediaCityUK to plant 350 trees in City Forest Park, Clifton, Salford. It’s a site adjacent to Wickes off the A666 (Manchester Road).

The event with City of Trees was an amazing opportunity for us to continue giving back to Salford’s landscape, involve people in our new home at MediaCityUK and invite our clients to join us, they have earned it with all their lovely design projects after all.

The day began on Tuesday at 10am, with everyone walking over the forestry commission land and grabbing a hot drink and a biscuit as we were briefed on what we would be doing for the day by the lovely City of Trees staff. Everyone got stuck in and the morning was spent digging holes in the ground to fit a long Oak tree root and breaking up the frozen mud with our hands to secure the tree upright in the ground. By 12pm everyone was exhausted from all the physical effort. At lunchtime the second wave of volunteers came down and gave the morning team a new lease of life, pushing to get the last trees planted before it went dark.

The turn out on was amazing. So many people took time out of their days to come and volunteer planting Oak, Hawthorn and Holly trees…even when the rain came in the afternoon, there were still volunteers willing to carry on planting. We would like to say a huge thank you to Horwich Farrelly Solicitors, Community Integrated Care, Keep Britain Tidy, Inspiring Communities Together, Essential Control, Ordsall Hall and so many other volunteers who took part. Not forgetting all of our clients that we have completed design briefs for in the last 12 months, it is for all these projects that a tree is planted.

The day was a huge success! Everyone turned up and wanted to help as much as they could, the entire day had a community feel and brought everyone together for one fantastic cause. I am so glad I went down and took part – Ellie Whittaker (Carbon’s Digital Account Executive)

Today has been great. I can now say I have planted an Oak tree! – Ian Footitt (Carbon’s Senior Creative)

We all had a really good time. Cold but rewarding! – Horwich Farrelly

This day was part of a much larger movement that underlines City of Trees. With an aim to restore Greater Manchester’s landscape by renewing abandoned, unloved woodland areas and planting a tree for every man, woman and child that lives in in the city…that’s 3 million trees, this was a great day to spread the word for them and introduce these volunteer opportunities to people that may not have know they were available.

To learn more about their amazing cause and to see how you can get involved, visit their website – http://www.cityoftrees.org.uk/

The positive feedback we have had so far about the day is really encouraging that what we are doing is valuable to the environment, knowing you can make a difference is one of the greatest feelings, watch this space for out next tree planting day.

Brief outline of your organisation:

Carbon Creative

We’re a branding and digital agency, we create new brands and enhance existing ones by developing beautiful branding, compelling campaigns, wondrous websites and marvellous motion. We’re also a low carbon social value company, we endeavour to transform the fortunes of our clients and the wellbeing of our community.

Author name:

Kate Hadfield – Carbon Creative

Which of the 10% Better Outcomes does your pledge relate to?

  • MORE volunteering
  • MORE use of parks and green space