The Barker and Stonehouse team with the new fleet of Maximover vans
Barker and Stonehouse, the UK’s largest independent, family run, furniture retailer is tackling carbon emissions with the introduction of its new fleet.
Following an investment of more than £200,000, the fleet of ten new eco-friendly Maximover vans are not only twice as fuel efficient as the firm’s previous vehicles, but are expected to reduce the company’s CO2 emission by around 102.7t per vehicle, per year – this offset is equivalent to 40 annual households’ worth of CO2.
James Barker, managing director at Barker and Stonehouse, explained: “Tackling climate change should be at the top of everyone’s agenda and we’re proud to be leading by example.
“We’re committed to making changes to our operations that reduce our environmental impact, whist ensuring we are continuously meeting customer expectations.
“The introduction of the new Maximover fleet will not only allow us to offer better customer service, through faster and more flexible delivery times, but will cost around 25p less per kilometre in
comparison to our previous vehicles – saving both money and time, as well as ultimately reducing emissions.”
The company’s investment in the new fleet is just one part of its continuous commitment to improving the overall environmental impact of the business. In fact, over the past decade the company has been recycling all its packaging and are one of the founding members of the re-forestation initiative, Trees4Trees, that started over ten years ago.
The ground-breaking initiative led by Barker and Stonehouse and based in and around the forests of Indonesia, has changed the way that timber is being grown and sourced for furniture, bringing a new lease of life into the communities who sow, grow and harvest the trees.
James Barker added: “For over 10 years, we have, wherever and whenever possible, been putting sustainability and environmental wellbeing at the heart of what we do.
“Alongside our other initiatives, we intend to introduce more Maximover vans in the coming months, with the aim of renewing the majority of the fleet over time.
“As technology develops, we’ll continue to look for further ways to improve our delivery performance as often and as much as we can.”