EcoVadis implementation for a sustainably-minded client
H Fosters 1875 are a chemical distribution company, handling non-hazardous chemicals for use in the making of soaps, candles, cosmetics, etc. They have an office in Oxfordshire as well as a warehouse in Leeds dealing with large, heavy goods and chemical containers, including tanks, drums, IBCs and other palletised formats. Their main business is in bulk chemical distribution but they also run a webshop to supply small quantities to cottage industries which has been of increasing importance to them.
H Fosters have been long-term clients of ours, having previously helped them implement and maintain their QMS/EMS for ISO 9001 and 14001 respectively. They have always been driven to be as sustainable a business as possible, and so when the time came for them to bolster their environmental strategy with an EcoVadis credential, we were delighted to help them.
Gold
rated.
Top 5%
of companies rated.
QFactorial Service offering
Implementation
Beginning with a trip to their offices, we immersed ourselves in their organisational culture to find out how they ticked! The client was already doing a lot of the right things needed for their EcoVadis assessment, so we helped them to document and report on the existing policies and procedures whilst implementing and providing training on new aspects. We then created reporting tools and documents to present all the fantastic initiatives and efforts the client was involved in to the EcoVadis assessors. Their CSR report has been published on their website and various topics have been covered in training sessions (DE&I, InfoSec, supply chain strengthening, impacts assessment, etc).
It was inspiring to work where everyone was on the same page and very open to suggestions and improvement. You can tell when you’re working with an organisation who genuinely want to do the right thing for the right reasons, not just badge collecting.
We were delighted when EcoVadis awarded them a Gold rating, placing H Foster 1875 in the top 5% of all companies assessed.
At the beginning of the year, we at H Foster started more in-depth discussions regarding Sustainability and to start robustly planning our next steps.
Using our go-to consultant team at QFactorial and with the sheer quantity of information on the web of what to do, we successfully made the decision to start our Ecovadis Certification.
As this was a new certification for us and we knew that we had good foundations already in place with our ISO 9001 and ISO 14001 (achieved again, with full support from QFactorial!), we were introduced to our consultant, and from the outset, her knowledge and guidance was insurmountable.
Full preparation and then finally submission was completed by October 2023 and certification was given the following month. We came out with a Gold! Higher than what we had thought we could have achieved for our first-time submission.
We are truly proud of our certifications, all of which are done with the full support of the amazing and knowledgeable staff at QFactorial.
From our MD, ‘I have a huge amount of admiration and they are very professional’.