How Just the Ticket is environmentally friendly
More and more parents are looking to subscription boxes for kids as a way to improve learning, spark curiosity and entertain children at home – particularly during a lockdown. Subscription boxes like Little Passports or Little Global Citizens are great fun for kids, but they come with some problematic factors.
Beyond the ‘entertainment-not-education’ factor there are environmental considerations when picking a subscription box. It’s something we wanted to avoid when we started out. Part of the reason for our online workbooks is for environmental reasons, to avoid unnecessary printing.
So here’s a little outline of the ways in which our workbooks consider environmental issues.
1. Our online workbooks minimize the total number of printed pages
On average each of our workbooks requires 6 printed sheets of paper. When was the last time you saw a kids’ activity book of only 6 pages? There are a couple of reasons for this.
Our workbooks are a combination of online and printable activities, which means we limit the amount of paper that’s needed. Lots of longer explanations can use videos, illustrations or infographics rather than words on printed pages. The worksheets are mostly used for writing out answers or completing activities which are difficult online, like drawing maps or wordsearches.
We’ve also recently found out that switching between screentime and offline activities is much better for kids’ eyes too!
Each workbook takes between 3-5 hours to complete, depending on whether it’s a regular workbook or a jumbo one. That means 3-5 hours of fun for only 6 printed pages. Fully printed workbooks of a similar length and quality can take as much as 4 times more paper!
The publishing industry uses huge amounts of paper every year – the U.S. alone uses 32 million trees every year to print books.
2. We don’t end up with wastage at the end
It’s a problem with the printing industry that doesn’t get talked about too often – wastage. In order to make commercial print runs possible, companies often have to print hundreds (if not thousands) more books/booklets than they’re going to sell. It’s built into the price.
Eventually those prints will end up being thrown out – burned or gone into landfill. As much as 40% of the waste in landfill sites come from paper.
Of course, new services and inventions, like print on demand or recycled paper are helpful, but these are expensive changes and therefore difficult for large companies to swallow.
It’s hard for small companies to know how many of a particular printed product they will sell, so often over order, ending up having to throw away wasted products.
With Just the Ticket and our online workbooks we don’t have to worry about it. Parents print their own pages – usually 6 pages per country (double-sided) – limiting waste. Plus if a child doesn’t want to complete a particular workbook, no printing happens at all.
3. We only ship 1 parcel for the whole year, then 12 postcards
Shipping can also put a big burden on their environment. Emissions from the shipping industry (over land, sea and by air) could be contributing as much as 17% of the world’s emissions currently. We’re all having to re-think our casual Amazon purchases with free next day delivery.
While many kids’ products that last a year, like subscription boxes, have to regularly ship medium size parcels, we ship one large envelope at the beginning of the journey, then 12 postcards, each of which provide access to our online workbook.
On average, a parcel creates 13 times more carbon than a letter or postcard. With 12 parcels replaced with 12 postcards over a year, it adds up.
Also, not to brag but because we use mostly illustrations rather than photographs in our online platform, we reduce our online storage burden by 90-ish%. One illustration is 90% smaller than a photograph.
4. We don’t include additional objects
Our focus is on learning activities, not providing kids with additional objects, which are often made from problematic materials. Some subscription boxes for kids include things like throwaway plastics, laminated paper products and one-use objects which are generally terrible for the environment.
While we do include a map, passport, and stickers in our Travel Packs, we hope these will be long-term items. The Maps in particular are designed to be stuck on the wall and pored over again and again. In fact, our planning for our second journey (coming 2022) will make use of the same map.
5. Our materials are recycled and environmentally friendly (including our shipping materials)
The postcards we use are recycled, as are most of the other printed materials in our Travel Packs (excluding the stickers). The packaging we use is made from sugarcane pulp, also called bagasse. Sugarcane is fast growing, like bamboo and the pulp is a by-product of producing sugar. Bagasse itself is both recyclable (with cardboard) or compostable in home compost bins.
6. We regularly talk about environmental issues with the kids
Learning about the world also means learning about the diverse environmental issues that are facing different countries. From deforestation to glacial retreat, pollution to desertification, we make sure to include crucial environmental issues when they come up. That doesn’t mean that every single workbook talks about environmental issues, but they’re a big part of our learning and our activities.
We want kids to be aware of and responsive to the environment they’re in, whether at home or abroad. We talk about respectful ways to communicate with local people, misconceptions about certain behaviours and potential dangers and risks in different places, like landmines in Vietnam.