5 tips to make your office more sustainable

Sustainability is everywhere, so the good news is that you can make gains in every area. Every little bit helps! Don't know where to start? In this blog we list 5 tips to make your office more sustainable.

#1: Turn off your monitor and lights etc.

Do you just collapse your laptop every day or do you close everything neatly? Do you always turn off the lights when you leave a room or do you leave them on? It's the little things that really make a difference. Do you work on a screen? Then turn off the monitor at the end of the day. Make sure you don't leave the dishwasher and coffee maker on unnecessarily. Walk an extra lap to pull the lights and electronics before you end your workday.

#2: Think before you print something out

Sometimes it's super convenient to have something printed out. You can then write nicely on it and put it wherever you want. But in most cases, it's simply unnecessary. Here's how you can easily replace it:

• Meeting agenda: keep your laptop there, put it on a big screen during the meeting or keep it on a tablet. Your phone can also, but that does create distractions
• Important mail: Print only the most important parts of it, reduce the font or copy all the text to a Word document. This will ensure that you do not print unnecessary pages or have pages with lots of white space
• Spreadsheet: see if you still have a screen somewhere (in the office) that you could work on. That way you can put the spreadsheet on one half and the document you are working in on the other. Working on 2 screens or a big screen has really made the difference for me, because I can switch so easily.
• Taking notes: I am totally in love with my iPad Air 4, with Apple Pencil 2 included. I use Remarkable to take notes on it and otherwise highlight PDFs via Books. This has saved me an awful lot of paper.

#3: Make your lunch and snacks sustainable

We could write blogs full of recipes with sustainable lunch recipes or tips. Here are a few:

1. Go mealprepping: cook in bulk so you save time, don't waste food and don't gravitate toward unhealthy take-away alternatives. Check out our earlier blog on mealprepping here.
2. Make soups from leftovers: vegetables or fruit left over? Don't throw it away, turn it into a nice gazpacho, smoothie or soup. Throw it in the blender with some powders/seeds (smoothie) or vegetable broth (gazpacho/soup) and you have a delicious meal that you can also freeze. Also, do you have some old bread lying around? If so, that would make a great base for crostinis in your soup.
3. Freeze things: leftover curry or soup? As long as there are not too many fresh vegetables in it, you can easily freeze it. Currently I have in my freezer of meals: Indian curry, Thai curry, pasta with vegan bolognaise sauce, vegan Mac & cheese, vegan lasagna and falafels. Freeze this one night in advance and you have a delicious lunch. For snacks, you can make an awful lot of them that you can easily freeze, such as raw pies or granola bars.

What recipes can you think of? We've got your back. Our favorite food blogs:

1. Naturally Nina: Australian girl what shares the most delicious vegan and gluten-free recipes. Some ingredients are a bit difficult to get because in Australia they have an easier time getting Asian products, but most of it is just easy to get or substitute.
2. Lisa goes Vegan: The reason I ever went vegan! Easy recipes of which 99% of the time you can just get everything at the Appie or Deka.
3. Vegetable Farmer: fine video recipes where everything is nice and healthy and easy. My favorite is still the Vietnamese sandwich! I make those anyway once a month for lunch.