WORLDWIDE Online Printing has taken a green leaf out of Al Gore's book and smartened up their way of business.

Caboolture branch owner Chris Woodman said it was a positive move into the future, but the decision was ultimately left up to the customers.

"It has to be a choice," Mr Woodman said "The product is there for us to use if anyone wants to use the product."

 

The green paper is available in letter heads, business cards and standard stationery and costs between 24-50% more than regular paper.

"The main aspect is it's imported and has the ISO numbering standard. The biggest factor is the ISO guidelines," Mr Woodman said.

The Worldwide Green Product was launched this week to coincide with Planet Ark's National Tree Day (July 27), on which the company planted 500 trees and committed to plant a new tree whenever a customer placed an order on Worldwide Green paper.

 

Going Green has been an 18-month process in which Worldwide Online Printing changed their inks to vegetable extracts which are now chemical free and in March they moved to waterless printing.

"We can all see this is the way to go," Mr Woodman said.

"If you're not going to change, someone's going to go there and be better than you."

 

Worldwide Online Printing changed to vegetable-based inks because "traditional printing inks are mineral oil based and contribute to greenhouse gas emissions, so we use vegetable based inks only.

 

The key ingredient in vegetable based inks is linseed oil, which is made from renewable resources such as flax.

"We (also) buy paper from suppliers who use pulp from sustainable sources such as softwood renewable forests.

Unlike pulp sourced from virgin hardwood timber softwood renewable forests are grown specifically for paper production, making the pulp a more sustainable solution." And, 99% of all their printing uses a Computer to Plate system as "these systems replace the use of film and some nasty chemicals in the prepress process."

Worldwide Online Printing has recognised the need to turn green and encourages businesses to follow its lead and reduce their paper use by printing on both sides of the papers, reconsider the need to print emails, switch to a digital fax machine or use a recycling bin for the paper you can't reuse within the office.

Caboolture News is looking forward to launching its Thinking Green pages on August 13 and invites households and businesses to share their "Green tips" with the wider community.