In August 2018 Ethical Consumer sent a questionnaire to Alibris, which included a question about the company's environmental policy. No response was received. The company's website www.alibris.com was searched. A page entitled 'Alibris Cares' was found, which contained the following statement regarding the company's environmental performance:
"Every time someone buys a used book, CD, or DVD from the Alibris marketplace and keeps it from ending up in a landfill, that's a benefit to the environment. And we do much more—from using energy-efficient light bulbs in our corporate offices to supporting the bike-to-work movement by making it easy for our employees to get to work on two wheels instead of four.
"Our Red & Green Team is a group of employees who work together to help the planet and its people. Our Red & Green Team is a volunteer employee committee that regularly meets to discuss “matters of the heart and the earth.” These meetings result in tangible recommendations that benefit our communities and our planet. We use compostable products at our company events and even compost our coffee grounds.
"We provide employees with vouchers for public transportation and van-pooling through the Commuter Check Program. In promoting the use of public transportation, we're doing our part to help improve air quality by reducing traffic congestion. Commuter Check is a pre-tax benefit so our employees also save on taxes."
An environmental policy was deemed necessary to report on its environmental performance and set targets for the future. A strong policy would include two future, quantified targets, demonstrate that the company had a reasonable understanding of its main impacts, be dated within the previous two years and be independently verified.
Alibris had none of these, therefore it received Ethical Consumer's worst rating for Environmental Reporting.
Reference:
www.alibris.com (14 August 2018)