Handley School children collect shoes for American Licorice's Souls 4 Soles drive in La Porte, Indiana

In 2011, Pat in La Porte Indiana began collecting shoes from associates and the community for the Soles4Souls shoe recycling program.

Soles4Souls is a shoe charity dedicated to recycling shoes for people in need, and since 2005, has delivered over 17 million pairs of  new and gently worn shoes.  The organization’s founder, Wayne Elsey, formed the organization after watching the aftermath of the 2004 tsuanami of Southeast Asia.  “He was at home one night, watching TV and he saw a picture of a single shoe washing up on the beach.”  Now Soles4Souls donates shoes to 127 countries worldwide.  Shoe donations protect health and allow children to attend schools.

This year, at Pat’s urging, we expanded the drive companywide. In La Porte, we collected 675 pairs of shoes, partially with the help of a nearby school. Pat advertised the shoe drive in the local newspaper.  Families with children from Handley School saw the article, and the children in one class organized their own shoe drive and brought shoes to our plant in La Porte. Handley School is one of the schools that American Licorice gave school supplies to at the beginning of the 2011 school year.

Union City showed their usual enthusiasm for recycling and collecting items for people in need, donating 267 pairs of shoes, and in Bend, we communicated the shoe drive to our neighbors in Northwest Crossing who helped us collect 42 pairs of shoes.  In total we donated 984 pairs of shoes.

Union City associates fill a large bin for Soles4Souls

Tony is active in his community and has donated prizes to the Fire Department in the past. He volunteers at school events in his community as well. “I carpool everyday”, Tony says, and he is a regular participant in the Commuting Incentive program,and has previously won the monthly gift certificate. He says he likes carpooling as it’s nice to be able to relax when he’s not the driver. When I asked Cynthia Shavies, who works with Tony in the Supply Chain Department about Tony’s donation, she said, “Tony’s a great guy. I wouldn’t have expected him to do anything else”.

Union City also celebrated Earth Day by collecting 622 pounds of clothing–from both associates and community members–to donate and recycle on Friday April 20th. Members of the Bend Office celebrated by cleaning up a neighboring road, and LaPorte worked with the Alliance for the Great Lakes to clean up trash from shorelines.

Our top shipping companies, ABF, Dependable, and FedEx are EPA Smart Way partners. Smart Way partners report their emissions and emissions reductions to the EPA annually. ABF, representing 20% of our shipments, has achieved a fuel efficiency/environmental score of 1.25, an outstanding score. ABF has reduced their emissions by voluntarily setting a maximum speed for their trucks, as well as strict equipment maintenance, and an “aggressive equipment replacement program”—ABF road tractors have an average age of 1-1/2 years.

Partnership with our customers represents additional opportunities to reduce our impact. We worked with Dot Foods in 2011, to optimize pick ups to reduce emissions and energy.

In 2012, we begin to work on measuring our impact in transportation and in the supply chain, a significant portion of our carbon footprint. Both inbound (energy used in the supply chain) and outbound (energy used in distribution and business travel) emissions are reported as part of Scope 3 emissions in carbon emissions reporting. We’ll work with shipping companies to estimate fuel used and use secondary data to estimate the energy used to produce and transport materials into our plants.

Current carbon emissions information for scope one and scope two can be viewed here.

Founded in 1994 by community members, KIDS Center works together with law enforcement, medical providers and social service agencies to create a supportive response to child abuse through prevention and diagnosis. The KIDS Center serve Deschutes, Crook, and Jefferson counties, and the Warm Springs Reservation at our Bend center.

American Licorice is proud to support the KIDS Center as a sponsor of the Blue Ribbon campaign and the Happy Girl’s Half Marathon in May.

Charitable Contributions Committee ties blue ribbons on a tree near our Bend office

Charitable Contributions Committee in Bend and our blue ribbon tree

Our teams also discussed the principles of sustainability, conserving resources, reducing impact, sustainable consumption, and helping people meet their needs.

At the end of each training session, we ask each team to commit to the Sustainability Challenge, and they agree to take on a project to make the offices mores sustainable. Here is what some of the teams at American Licorice have implemented or are in the process of implementing:

1. Eliminated bottled water from Plant Offices in Union City, California and La Porte, Indiana.
2. Replaced water coolers with filtered water in Bend, Oregon (saving energy).
3. Changed printing defaults to print on both sides.
4. Set up a consistent recycling system for office associates in Bend, Oregon.
5. Optimize customer pick-ups by distribution center and plant to consolidate shipments and reduce transportation emissions.
6. Recycle all toner cartridges in the field.

To build sustainable behavior into everyday practices, in March we launched an incentive program called Take One Action. Program themes change monthly:

April: Associates use alternative transportation at least 4 times. We are giving away bicycles in each location during Earth Day week.

May: The theme is waste reduction, for example, packing waste free lunches with reusables in place of paper bags and plastic sandwich bags.

June: Energy efficiency and water conservation, for example, an office could collectively agree to lower the heating temperature by one degree (or raise the cooling temperature by one degree).

July: Make a change at the office, for example, avoiding printing for one day.

By getting everyone involved to take one action, each month, and build sustainability into everyday behavior, we will quickly and effectively become a greener business and help create a greener world.

Congratulations to Joaquin and the associates of Union City for their outstanding performance in waste reduction and on their recognition by Union City.

Mayor Mark Green and Joaquin Almaguer

According to Sharon, one of our Bend associates and a bowler extraordinaire, “We had a great time!  It was fun having representation from several departments on our team and we bowled for a great cause!”

Here’s some photos of our happy and no doubt, very skilled bowlers:

The team at Junior Achievement's Bowl A Thon on March: John, Mercedes, Shannon, Jesse, Sharon, Wes, and Chandra

Sharon warms up her bowling fingers

You can read the stories from all the winners by clicking here.

A panel of judges chose the first round of winners.

K-4 Stories:

• Why Every Little Thing Does Make A Difference
• We Care to Share

5-8 Stories:

• What a Difference a Pencil Makes
• School Supplies in an Inner City Classroom

9-12 Stories:

• The Boy Who Flew
• As we manipulate our world!!!

These teachers will each receive a check for $500.00.

The second round winners (voted on by Kids In Need Foundation facebook frans from the two choices above) are:

K-4 Stories:

• Why Every Little Thing Does Make A Difference

5-8 Stories:

• What a Difference a Pencil Makes

9-12 Stories:

• The Boy Who Flew

These teachers will receive an additional check for $250.00.

Congratulations and thank you to all who entered and to our winners.

• The emissions from 164 passenger vehicles.
• 6 acres of standing forest.
• The emissions from annual energy consumption of 81 households.
• Over 101,000 gallons of gasoline.
• 8.5% of American Licorice’s total carbon emissions from stationery combustion (gas) and electricity.

American Licorice achieved a 92% recycling rate in Union City, California in 2011, and a 92-93% recycling rate in LaPorte, Indiana in the months of November and December of 2011.

Read more about the EPA WasteWise partners program here.

Note:  total metric tons of carbon emissions reduced from waste reduction was updated on March 1st based on a corrected Climate Profile report from EPA WasteWise.

• Charitable Match Program
• Dollars for Volunteers, Matching Off-Work Volunteering Hours with Charitable Contributions
• 16 paid hours for volunteering, each year
• The Volunteer Vine, communicating local opportunities
• Service Trips and Team Volunteering Event Coordination
• Volunteer of the Month Award
• Junior Achievement Bowl-a-Thon Team Sponsorship (Bend, Oregon)
• High Desert Museum Membership (Bend, Oregon)
• Bend, Oregon Running/Walking Teams to support events (Sponsorship or Entry Fee Contribution/Match):
•    Healthy Beginnings Grin and Bear It 5K Run/Walk, 1 Mile Family Fun Run (March 10th)
•    CASA Light of Hope 5K/10K Run/Walk, 1 Mile Family Fun Run (April 22nd)
•    Happy Girls Half Marathon, Relay, and 5K (May 27th)
•    The Jingle Bell Run (December)