Becoming the ‘Green Link’ in the Supply Chain

Julie Starr • May 28, 2021



When it comes to running a business, every small business owner and manager knows that it takes an awful lot of work and collaborating with other businesses in order to make things work effectively. 

The supply chain is an essential part of running a business, but we are all aware of the environmental impact working alongside so many other businesses can have.
The good news is that no matter how small or large your business, every company can do what they can to create a better world to live in. 

So whether you’re in the game of bookkeeping or you make goods to sell to people’s homes, there’s always the potential to make things a little greener throughout your supply chain. Here are some ideas as to where you can start.

Use ‘Green’ Suppliers 

You may have considered changing suppliers previously and noticed a higher price in what they do compared to other companies. The reason they tend to charge more is due to the fact that greener suppliers have a huge effect on the carbon implications of bringing new products onto the market. 

Collaborate with green businesses, and that will have a direct impact on your own carbon footprint, as well as giving you the opportunity to learn best practices from them about how you can improve in the future. 

Taking the time to assess these alternative supplies should uncover several potential benefits of changing. One of the biggest being appealing to a range of customers, coming second to lowering your own carbon footprint.

Use Less Packing and Consolidate Shipments  

We have access to a range of materials that are designed to help companies to make their packages smaller and lighter. Not only does this reduce the overall cost of shipping but it also allows shipping containers to carry more products in a load. Using recycled or recyclable materials helps to eliminate excess packing materials that would otherwise go into landfills. 

Another thing you could do is to encourage your customers to consolidate all of their orders. Larger companies are able to offer their customers to pay less for shipping and have them all sent at once in less packaging. At the end of the day, your customers are going to enjoy the prospect of being able to save money easily. It also helps you as a business to reduce your carbon emissions. 

Try to Stay Local 

Shipping goods and services for long distances is possible and is a sure way of being able to reach a wider target audience, however, shipping long distances can have disastrous implications on the environment. If you also retrieve goods from far distances then your carbon footprint will increase tenfold. 

Try sourcing some of your products that are closer by or are closer by to major markets and watch your energy use reduce significantly. 

Using local couriers will also help you to be able to plan smarter routes that can help to further reduce carbon emissions. 

Reuse where you can 

For owners of small business premises, it may be tempting to buy everything brand new when you need to refit. However, you don’t have to spend more money than necessary making changes. Some gently used, pre-loved fittings, fixtures, and furniture can be all you need. Take a browse around local flea markets and online for some truly unique pieces that will make all the difference. 

Or if it’s just a small facelift that you’re after, head to your local hardware store to pick up some sandpaper and paint materials to upcycle your existing furniture. Not only will you then have unique-looking stuff, doing this will help you to get a unique aesthetic with a limited impact on the environment. It will help your small business, but will also have a domino effect on the supply chain on the whole. 

Start Now 

Buyers are placing an increasing amount of importance on eliminating waste and excess pollution from small businesses. Making progress and showing customers how you are doing that will enforce the positive impression of your brand to customers and employees. 

Focus on the things you can control within your own business and then prepare to advise other businesses throughout the supply chain and beyond each  and every company has the potential to begin its journey towards becoming more environmentally sustainable . It is important to start sooner rather than later, knowing that even the smallest of changes can make the world of difference to their carbon footprint.

Smart Sensors, Smarter Supply Chains: Enhancing Traceability in Food & Beverage

By Julie Starr • June 20, 2025
In today’s competitive food and beverage (F&B) landscape, traceability is no longer a compliance checkbox—it’s a differentiator. The ability to track every step of a product’s journey, from origin to shelf, is vital for regulatory accuracy and to ensure brand integrity, supply chain agility, and consumer trust. Add smart sensors to the mix: the quiet, tireless observers revolutionizing supply chain intelligence. Traceability Has a Data Problem Despite digitization across many F&B operations, most traceability systems still rely on fragmented or manual data inputs. Batch numbers, barcodes, and handwritten logs often stand between a supplier and clarity when things go wrong. This approach struggles with latency and scale. When contamination or delays occur, root cause analysis is slow, costly, and damaging. Smart sensors shift this paradigm by embedding real-time, contextual intelligence into every stage of the supply chain . Whether monitoring humidity in transit or recording fill-level precision in bottling plants, they remove the guesswork by turning physical conditions into structured, time-stamped data. From Passive Monitoring to Active Optimization Sensors used to be reactive tools, alerting operators to anomalies. But smart sensors now play a proactive role in process control. They measure, and they interpret. For example, temperature sensors embedded in cold chain logistics can dynamically adjust cooling systems or flag threshold breaches before spoilage occurs. These advancements reduce waste and loss at a systemic level. In a production facility, smart sensors integrated with PLCs can enforce recipe compliance, verify clean-in-place processes, and detect micro-stoppages in real-time. This enables operations to pivot faster and isolate inefficiencies before they cascade downstream. Trust is Built on Transparency Consumers are paying more attention to what they eat and drink. They’re looking beyond labels, expecting visibility into how ingredients are sourced, processed, and handled. Smart sensors make this level of transparency achievable —without burdening manufacturers with excessive manual oversight. By capturing metadata throughout production and distribution, these sensors create a digital footprint that’s tamper-resistant and instantly accessible. When this data is integrated with a central platform, brands can respond confidently to audits, recalls, and quality assurance challenges with a level of precision that would be impossible through legacy systems. Intelligence Without Infrastructure Overhaul One common misconception is that adding smart sensors requires a top-down reinvention of supply chain infrastructure. In reality, companies can deploy edge sensors in a modular, scalable way. Many modern solutions offer plug-and-play functionality, allowing for fast integration with existing machinery and MES systems. This is where suppliers like alps-machine.com are reshaping expectations. Rather than pushing proprietary ecosystems, they design sensor-ready equipment with interoperability in mind. This future-proofs investment and keeps businesses nimble in the face of regulatory or market shifts. Designing for Data Longevity Sensors are only as powerful as the context they capture. A smart implementation ensures the data collected can be standardized, stored securely, and accessed meaningfully across departments. This means moving beyond local dashboards toward centralized, queryable datasets that inform everything from supplier contracts to marketing claims. As AI and predictive analytics become more accessible, these data-rich environments will unlock new capabilities—such as predicting demand spikes based on real-time freshness indicators or adjusting production schedules dynamically based on in-transit sensor feedback. Final Thoughts: Smarter Isn’t Optional Traceability isn’t solved by more paperwork—it’s solved by embedded intelligence. Smart sensors don’t just help businesses know what happened; they help prevent the wrong things from happening at all. For companies in the food and beverage sector, adopting smart sensors is less about chasing innovation and more about enabling resilience, speed, and confidence in every decision.

Eco-Friendly Garden Prep: Summer Tips for a Greener Business Space

By Julie Starr • June 5, 2025
If you're lucky enough to have a garden as part of your business, taking some time to set it up for summer is a great investment of your energy. Not only will it be ready for your customers to spend time in, but you can also incorporate some eco-friendly elements into it. Many people just think about the property and what eco-friendly updates they can make , but there are plenty that you can implement in your garden. This gives you the best of both worlds. You own a sacred and beautiful place for your customers to spend their summer, and at the same time, you can do your part for a better planet. If this is the route you want to take, then you also need to consider how to do this with the different seasons. To help you on your journey, here are some top tips for preparing your garden for summer. Plant trees and flowers Planting trees and flowers in your garden is a must. It will make a beautiful scene of nature for everyone to enjoy. Trees will provide people and animals with shade, as well as provide a habitat for wildlife. More trees are needed in the world because they purify the air that we breathe. Flowers, especially if you plant with pollinators in mind, can be an excellent way to attract bees and butterflies, which contribute largely to the earth. Use natural pest control When preparing your garden for summer, you can do this more sustainably and kindly by using natural pest control. Simply by planting trees and flowers, you are likely to attract lots of different wildlife, some of which may destroy your efforts. While all wildlife should be considered, you may need to take measures. Some better and more eco-friendly ways you can do this, as opposed to spraying toxic chemicals onto your plants and into the air, you can implement companion planting, using protective nets over your crops, choosing resilient plants, using natural repellents, and encouraging natural predators so nature can do its thing. Maintain your garden Maintaining your garden in itself can make it more eco-friendly. Composting your garden waste regularly, and kitchen waste can help you to reduce overall waste and create nutrient-rich soil. This is a great cycle of sustainability. You can also keep on top of things that need cleaning and replacing, so you can recycle the materials for other garden structures and projects, and repurpose things around your garden before they become waste. If you have features in your garden like a swimming pool, then a regular pool maintenance service is going to be vital in keeping your water consumption to a minimum, as when it is cleaned and maintained, it will need to be drained and refilled less as well as using less energy. You could also consider how you can use natural purification methods to reduce chemical usage and support biodiversity right in your backyard. Your garden is just an eco-friendly project waiting to be built. Use these top tips to help you get started.