Skip to main content

Ever since business founder John Harding began making and selling furniture back in 1856, the company has been passionate about looking after its staff, customers and the communities that it serves. From involvment in numerous community projects and supporting local charities to being among the first furniture retailers to embrace a full recycling programme for waste, the company acknowledges its role in building a better future.

We've committed to becoming 'net zero' by 2030. 'Net zero' is reached when the amount the company adds in greenhouse gas emissions to the atmosphere is no more than the amount removed from it.


What are we doing to reduce our carbon footprint?

More efficient, greener deliveries

Over the past 5 years, we have completely overhauled our delivery fleet. Instead of using large, inefficent and slow lorries, we were among the first to transition to smaller, more fuel efficient Maxi-Mover vehicles. They can carry the same volume of furniture but consume up to 50% less fuel, reducing our emissions significantly, and as an added bonus, they are much more nimble around the narrow lanes of the South West too!

We have also pioneered the use of advanced delivery planning software, bringing the US's leading 'last mile' delivery platform from Dispatch Track to the UK over 8 years ago. This system enables us to plan the most fuel efficient routes, avoid traffic blackspots and provide customers with real-time tracking of their delivery from the night before by giving a 90 minute delivery window notification.

 

 


Recycling all packaging waste

When we deliver your new furniture, if you have opted for our 'delivery and set-up' service, our delivery team will unpack and set-up your furniture for you, taking away all the packaging. That packaging is brought back to our distribution centres, where it is compacted and baled, ready for onward recycling back into new packaging. 

We recyle over 100 tonnes of packaging per year, which is a lot of cardboard, plastic and polystyrene!


Electric Vehicles (EVs) & Workplace EV Charging

Over the past 4 years, we have commenced a programme to electrify our non-delivery vehicle fleet.  These are the cars and small vans used by our estimators and other members of our store and head office teams. This process will continue as existing combustion engine vehicles in the fleet reach the end of their life.

Alongside this roll-out of electric vehicles (EV), we have installed EV charging points at all our sites to encourage our employees to make the move to electric vehicles for their own private cars. With up to 25% of people living in homes where provision of a charging for an EV is simply not possible, workplace EV charging is a vital tool to encourage adoption, and we're delighted to play our part.

 


Renewable power for all our stores

Our Tavistock store had a large solar power system installed back in 2013 and has been producing a significant proportion of the electricity the store needs since then.

In early 2022, we completed a £100,000 investment in the installation of large solar power generation plants at all our remaining stores, giving us the capability to produce up to 50% of our annual electricity consumption.

For the energy we can't generate ourselves, we make sure that we source electricty from suppliers who produce 100% of their energy from renewable sources - such as solar and wind - where practicable. We are also actively working to reduce and ultimately remove our use of natural gas.


Improving energy efficiency across the business

Whether it be through the use of LED and other low voltage lighting, upgrading heating controls to newer more efficient models, improving insulation or simply making sure lights are turned off when not required, we're taking lots of small steps to reduce our carbon footprint each and every day.  All our stores have been insulated to improve thermal efficiency and we're continuing to work on further improvements.

Saving energy and helping on the journey to 'Net Zero' is a whole company challenge, so educating everyone within the company to think about how they can reduce their carbon footprint is very important.

 


But we still have more to do......

Planting trees for a greener future

We are actively working on a new scheme to support the planting of trees in the UK and around the world.  This will enable us to plant a tree for every order placed with us, thereby helping to rebuild the forests that are so important in controlling the global levels of greenhouse gases.


Reducing water consumption

While our stores do not use large volumes of water, we're investigating installing rainwater harvesting systems to collect the water from the roofs of our buildings when it rains and using this for flushing toilets.


 

Stay In Touch Sign up for exclusive offers and new products