Essentra

Wishing all our customers and colleagues a Happy Diwali.   May this Diwali bring light and prosperity to you and your families.

This October, we are celebrating Black History Month at Essentra with the theme “Breaking Bias”. At Essentra, we are committed to creating a safe and supportive work environment that champions equality and celebrates diversity – this is embedded into the ‘Culture’ pillar of our ESG strategy. We have planned events and content throughout the month and encourage our colleagues to ‘Break Bias’, 'Make Equality Work' and 'Be Inclusive' this October, and beyond. Although traditionally celebrated in October in the UK, Ireland, Netherlands, Belgium, and Germany, and in February in the US & Canada, we are running each event globally. This means we get the opportunity to celebrate this important event twice.

We are marking Recycle Week at Essentra this week and have a range of events going on at our global sites, including sharing best practice on waste reduction, a sustainability quiz and our global sustainability townhalls. As a business, we aim to be zero waste to landfill across our operations, as well as minimising the waste we generate across the product lifecycle. We have committed to reduce overall waste intensity by 50% by 2030, compared to 2019, and for all sites to achieve zero waste to landfill by 2030 at the latest. In 2023, across our operations 94% of our waste was diverted from landfill and our waste intensity has reduced 28% compared to 2019. We have also committed to have 50% recycled content in our packaging materials by 2030 and support a circular economy by ensuring 100% of our packaging is reusable, recyclable or compostable by 2030. Currently we have 28% recycled content in our packaging and 58% of our packaging is reusable, widely recyclable or compostable. Find out more in the ESG section of our annual report - https://lnkd.in/dQyfVZ2e

Our Make It Work Awards celebration continues with our next award category for "We deliver", recognising someone who embraces change, challenges the status quo and drives innovation through continuous improvement. The winner was Christoph Mühlenbeck, our Innovative Project Lead based in Germany.  Christoph creates innovative ideas and develops global campaigns with his best practices. He demonstrates everyday energy to improve our customer service and creates solutions to deliver a hassle free customer experience.   We congratulate Christoph once again for his Make It Work Award!

As part of recognising our colleagues, each year we hold our company-wide Make It Work Awards celebrations. Each award represents one of our values at Essentra and employees are encouraged to nominate colleagues and teams who have gone above and beyond. This year we had over 600 nominations across the 6 categories and we celebrated our winners with global site celebrations earlier in the year. We'll be introducing them over the coming weeks. First up our award category for "We champion equality and celebrate diversity", recognising someone who creates a safe and supportive work environment that champions equality and celebrates diversity, and utilises our differences to deliver positive results. The winner was Amie Green, leader of our internal LGBTQ+ network, SPECTRUM, and Senior SEO Executive, based in the UK. Amie is the driving force behind our annual Pride celebrations and creates a safe, supportive and inclusive work environment for her peers through the SPECTRUM network year-round. Through this work, she has touched many people who have shared videos and messages showing their support and appreciation for these campaigns. We congratulate Amie once again for her Make It Work Award!

We have joined the Hidden Disabilities Sunflower network! An extension of our existing Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DE&I) programme, this internationally recognised initiative is designed to foster an environment of inclusivity, acceptance and understanding, aiming to significantly improve the day-to-day experiences of individuals with invisible disabilities in the workplace. Emma Reid, our Company Secretary and the initiative’s sponsor, says: “This new initiative is an important part of a series of campaigns within Essentra that will continue to help us achieve our DE&I goals which include celebrating Pride, Black History Month, International Women’s Day and International Men’s Day.” Read more: https://buff.ly/47oj7ev

As a part of our hidden disabilities awareness activities, our colleagues have been sharing their stories about their life with hidden disabilities. Today, we are sharing the story of our Sustainability Manager, Rebecca Wilson. "I was born with a condition called VACTERL Association, which is a group of deformities which affects 1 in 10,000 babies. One of the deformities I was born with is Trachea- Oesophageal Fistula, which although surgically corrected, has resulted in lifelong swallowing issues." Read more below:

The theme for our Sustainability Week in June was "Get out into nature", and we ran a competition for our employees to share photos of nature local to them, at our sites around the world.    We received some amazing photos which show the diversity of nature across our sites. Our employees voted for their favourite images, and we are proud to share the top three photos from the challenge.   Congratulations once again to those in the top three and thank you to all those who took part.

As part of our hidden disabilities awareness activities, our colleagues have been sharing their stories about their life with hidden disabilities. Today we hear from our Head of PMO, Jon Wallis, about how epilepsy affects his life. "Colleagues who work at our Kidlington site may have seen me hobbling around with a walking stick but actually, I have only needed this for the past 3 years or so. I am in my 50s and I have lived with a hidden disability for most of my life, something which most people do not realise." Read more below.

Globally, 1 in 7 of us live with a disability. This is approximately 1.3 billion people. This month we are raising awareness of hidden disabilities, as part of our diversity, equity and inclusion efforts, to help colleagues better understand hidden disabilities, offer appropriate assistance and cultivate a supportive and inclusive work environment. We are committed to creating a safe, supportive work environment that champions equality and celebrates diversity and it is embedded into the Culture pillar of our ESG strategy. Throughout this month, you'll be hearing from some of our colleagues about their lives with a hidden disability.