Woodhouse Opticians on stage at the Optician Awards 2022
Sustainability has shot up the corporate agenda in recent years and everyone, rightly so, seems to want to do their bit. While some practices speak loudly but do little, two practices – Blackpool-based Woodhouse Opticians, and Pearce and Blackmore Opticians, which operates from two sites in the Cardiff area – have become known for the polar opposite.
The former won Sustainable Practice of the Year at the Optician Awards 2022 while the latter was shortlisted for the same. Their stories are inspirational.
Starting the journey
Sukie Woodhouse, director at Woodhouse Opticians, tells how her practice’s journey began when ‘during lockdown I became increasingly aware of the amount of plastic wrapping on my groceries; lettuce wrapped in thin films of plastic and even broccoli and bananas’. Living by the sea, her walks along the beach revealed ‘tons of plastic fishing gear, netting twine, chip forks straws and balloons.’
This, she says, prompted her to consider the plastic waste in her business and optics in general. On reopening up from lockdown, Woodhouse says that she came back with renewed energy to address the sustainability of the practice. This meant dealing with ‘distressing’ volumes of single use materials such as plastic waste, dummy lenses and packaging contact lenses.
Clare Pearce, director and principal optometrist at Pearce and Blackmore Opticians (pictured below, right), has a similar story. She began with changes at home, ‘largely motivated by seeing the impact that our choices have on the natural world. I love being outdoors and seeing news articles and photographs of plastic pollution affecting the landscape and wildlife was enough to know I had to start making some changes.’
But being in business – and a director – gave her the freedom, she says, ‘to make green choices within my business. My children gave me even more motivation to do my part to stop ruining the Earth for their future.’ She feels that if she makes sustainable choices in her day-to-day working life then ‘the next generation will grow up with these as their norm.’
A journey that morphs
For Woodhouse, grabbing the low hanging fruit involved the practice blocking up gaps that let heat out, fixing windows, changing light fittings, putting up signs encouraging switching off appliances, installing an energy meter, and changing energy suppliers to 100% renewable energy.
Pearce too started small and built up for no other reason than to not be overwhelmed by the process. ‘Small swaps came first,’ says Pearce, ‘for example, from teabags to loose leaf tea. Then swaps that required more effort such as changing to an ethical bank and using renewable energy companies.’
To her, sustainability means choosing actions that create no harm which can be sustained long term. She also feels that sustainability is much more than a one-time journey – ‘I don’t think we can ever get to the place where we’ve done enough.’
But beyond the commonsense changes, Woodhouse, wanted her practice to learn more about the subject. This was done through the Skills Network where she says everyone registered for the level 2 certificate in Understanding Sustainability.
Staff put the effort in as it was necessary to ‘consider the whole circle of sustainability from economy to environment and people. The course was the catalyst to see how far we could go along our sustainability route and since then we have made more and more changes.’
Keeping the momentum going
Of course, projects can start in a blaze of glory but run out of steam. As to how Pearce kept going, she says that she likes to keep herself informed of the impact of pollution and climate change as it ‘helps me to keep the momentum going.’ Her worry is that sustainability is seen as a ‘topical’ subject where ‘tick lists are created to look good but the work on the ground is not always being done. 'I find the more I bring it up with my patients or my friends, the more we keep it at the forefront of people’s minds,' she says.
Some of the sustainable efforts at Pearce and Blackmore Opticians
Woodhouse, on the other hand, thinks that ‘momentum is maintained because others within the world of optics are taking an interest in sustainability.’ She cites the Association of British Dispensing Opticians achieving carbon neutral status, ‘uniting people in the industry under their Thinking Green initiative,’ and her suppliers being happy to answer questions on their journey towards sustainability.
And as a director of Sight Care Business Group, she leads on sustainability and encourages suppliers to submit a sustainability statement to the members. On top of that, Woodhouse says that she has been in discussions with the local Chamber of Commerce ‘whose advisor is now helping us work towards carbon offsetting.’
Beyond this, Woodhouse’s practice tells patients of its efforts to be sustainable when it comes to frames and chosen suppliers. She says everyone is interested to know more and around half are eager to purchase frames from suppliers, such as Sea2See or Eco, that offer clear evidence of the materials their frames are made from.
Woodhouse also collects old frames and recycles them via Re-Worked and says that ‘anyone from the community can pop in with their old frames.’ She also operates a preloved scheme where used frames are offered to patients without the means to replace a broken frame, albeit in exchange for a small donation to the practice’s chosen charity.
Pearce does something similar and comments that such actions have set her practice apart from rivals. She has a range of second-hand frames called New to Me where patients can buy a “new” pair of spectacles but use a frame that already exists. Doing this gives the practice ‘an opportunity to talk to patients about eco choices; we always explain why we have the range.’
It should be said that Pearce’s practice has made a wider pledge to talk about its sustainable choices as it shares ideas on how to be greener. This, she says, had a positive effect in the community and among patients. And she gives an example – offering packaging materials that cannot be returned to suppliers to the community to be reused. Small boxes, brown paper, and some bubble wrap are at the heart of this, and Pearce says that ‘patients are becoming more aware of this offer.’
Her practice is also seeing patients attend precisely because of the sustainable values it holds. In fact, Pearce is seeing patients wanting to reuse an old frame as well as asking to recycle old glasses and contact lens cases. She cites this as a desire to avoid landfill and so has invested in a suitable recycling system.
Sustainability does come with cost implications. Here Woodhouse details that she is not on the best deal on her energy supplier and despite her broker suggesting other suppliers, ‘I insist on using only those with 100% renewable energy sources.’ Also, she is paying more to have cardboard recycled as opposed to being removed by the usual waste contractor.
But – and this is important – she too says that being sustainable ‘has differentiated us from others; we are able to clearly state our intentions and share these on the website and with our patients on a live board which we periodically update.’
Suppliers respond
And suppliers are responding too. Pearce describes how her practice has contacted suppliers to ask if they can either deliver products without plastic packaging or, failing that, take back packaging to be reused. ‘This,’ she says, ‘has been received with mixed results, most being happy for us to send back the packaging and only one delivering products without plastic.’
She says that she would love to see manufacturers actively promote the reuse of packaging, ideally with a returns label. From Woodhouse’s standpoint, suppliers seem to be responding ‘more to the zeitgeist rather than our individual requests.’ It helps that her practice has also changed who it orders from – it is now almost entirely ordering from those that can evidence they have made changes towards sustainability.
‘Unfortunately,’ says Woodhouse, ‘as NHS providers we need to source good quality low-cost frames for teenagers and thus far have been unable to find a supplier that can offer this.’ Naturally, it helps that some major suppliers had begun, as Woodhouse tells, to address waste in the profession – she singles out Johnson & Johnson’s Terracycle, which enables the return of used contact lenses, packs and foil covers to the practice for recycling.
Nevertheless, Pearce knows that green choices are not the easiest nor most time efficient choices, which is why she thinks that few businesses are proactive in this area.
The future
As to the future, Woodhouse wants a net zero world, in general, by 2050. She hopes to achieve that much sooner with her own practice, and is planning to calculate its ‘greenhouse gas inventory’ before moving onto phase two – actually moving towards net zero.
And to get to a better place Pearce has the practice’s green policy tracking its current situation and what needs to be addressed in the future. In her view, success is about ‘keeping sustainability on your radar and not becoming complacent, thinking the “eco box” has been ticked.’
