Corporate Responsibility

Gestalten is dedicated to producing high quality publications that are environmentally friendly and resource efficient. Paper is a valuable resource and to prove our commitment to producing sustainable books, since 2001, the company has been using internationally certified paper accepted by the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) for environmental protection in all of our products.

The FSC seal guarantees paper products coming from responsibly managed forests. To further ensure the quality of our publications, we also work with certified printing houses in Europe and Asia that follow international standards for quality and safety that comply with sustainable, economical and ecological production processes (environment management system ISO 14001) to reduce impact on the environment.

Our commitment to corporate responsibility is firm. We aim to minimize the environmental impact of our business activities by becoming a climate neutral company. The carbon emissions that we produce as a company, unfortunately, cannot be removed from the atmosphere, but by investing in renewable and energy efficient CO2 neutralising technology such as water power and wind power, we can help replace old technology such as coal and fuel power plants as well as diesel generators which produce harmful greenhouse gases.

Gestalten works with the international carbon offset provider myclimate, a non-profit organization that originated as a spin-off of ETH Zurich (Swiss Federal Institute of Technology), in order to calculate and offset the total amount of carbon emissions we produce through our business activities. These include the carbon output from our office in Berlin, our warehouses, production processes, the transportation of books from the printing houses to our international warehouses as well as our distribution partners, and the individual travel and commuting of all company personnel.

In 2007, Gestalten’s carbon footprint was roughly 1100 tons of CO2, which translates into approximately 20,000 Euros based upon the calculation of tons per emission. This amount has been donated to myclimate to help build the first wind energy plant in Madagascar, a project designed to reduce deforestation and shortage in electricity supply as well as create jobs for local workers to enhance the quality of air and water in the Northern city of Ramena and its surrounding areas.