Community

Making a difference in our communities, one employee at a time.

On Thursday June 12, Schenker of Canada’s Air import and export team located in Mississauga, Ontario, held a fundraiser raffling tickets for a chance to win various gift baskets.

The airfreight team has a fundraiser twice a year, June and December; and with each fundraiser a different charity is chosen.   For June 12th fundraiser,  the team collected $816.00 for the “Children’s Make a Wish Foundation”.

We thank everyone who purchased tickets to help make a child’s wish come true.

By Joanne Edwards
International Air Export Manager

DBS gives a Dual Benefit to the Community and the Environment.

Supporting sustainability and minimizing our impact on the earth are ideas the Freeport, New York colleagues work towards each day. ANYTHING GREEN that you do HELPS BENEFIT OUR ENVIRONMENT, says Deniz Tanacan, Environmental Analyst/Specialist. So when the Freeport office needed to dispose of 70 office chairs, the office researched options to either donate or recycle the chairs to divert the chairs from ending up in a landfill.

Since the Freeport office has an established relationship with the Salvation Army due to our continued donations, we contacted the organization to inquire if they would accept a donation of 70 office chairs. Major Jose Guzman at the Salvation Army said that the organization would come over to our location to inspect the chairs and then decide if the chairs could be of use. Major Guzman visited the Schenker facility and gladly accepted our offer. Major Guzman then arranged for his warehouse location to pick up the chairs. “We are so grateful for Schenker’s constant support, says Major Guzman of the Salvation Army, Freeport, NY. The Salvation Army will ensure that his donation will help the most deserving in our communities.”

Most furniture is resource-intensive to produce, and if dumped, takes up large amounts of landfillspace. 70 chairs later, the Freeport office assisted with the environment and renewed the life cycle of office furniture. Natures’ raw materials of wood, steel, and energy are saved, landfill usage is spared and open space is preserved.

We’re Making a Big Difference in Our Communities

Schenker, Inc. prides itself in being an environmentally conscious company. We encourage all of our offices to become involved with Green Initiatives like recycling programs in their local communities.

Schenker’s Corporate Freeport and Branch Office colleagues are also committed to being more community-conscious. On April 22, 2013, Freeport colleagues volunteered at the Merrick Road Park located in Merrick, New York, on Earth Day to assist the park with various clean-up activities.

In June 2013, employees volunteered at the Garden City Environmental Center/Bird Sanctuary, located in Garden City, New York, to assist with repairing broken fences, debris removal and cleanup. This center was heavily impacted by damage from Hurricane Sandy. During this one visit, 10 huge bundles of tree parts were collected, tied together, and carried curbside for disposal.

In September 2013, our Freeport colleagues volunteered at the Garden City Environmental Center/Bird Sanctuary once again to assist with weeding, painting fences, planting trees and debris clean up. This was such a huge success and it turned out to be a great team building event. Colleagues enjoyed working together as a group, not only helping the non-profit Center, but also the environment. The group asked Brenda Kelly and Deniz Tanacan to seek out more events like this.

As a result, in October 2013, Freeport colleagues volunteered at the Brookside Preserve in Freeport, New York. This 22 acre fresh water preserve housing many resident birds and other animals was in need of volunteer assistance. The Freeport colleagues spent an hour and a half picking up trash, plastic and glass bottles. They filled so many trash bags, they were asked to assist with clean-up more often.

On Friday, November 15, 2013, Freeport colleagues revisited the Brookside Preserve in Freeport to assist with a major garbage clean-up. Schenker colleagues noticed this site was sometimes used as a dumping ground that only hurts the environment and natural habitat. Freeport colleagues have pledged to assist with clean-up as much as possible.

Everyone who has been involved with these projects feels great about doing their part. Many materials such as plastic bottles and aluminum cans are 100 per cent recyclable, but unless they get collected, their potential is being trashed. Recycling significantly reduces the amount of materials that end up in our waste stream and that means less waste is landing in landfills or getting incinerated and potentially polluting the air we breathe.

And in Toronto, Canada – As a part of the Earth Day Celebration on April 22, three offices in Toronto organized an event of cleaning the building’s parking lots.

Recycling Wood to Build Lives

Schenker’s Indianapolis branch flies in a 747 charter three times a week. In order to maximize the build of the aircraft, 2×4 wooden planks are used when building the aircraft pallets. By doing so, Schenker is able to increase the total tonnage capacity of each flight. A small portion of the 2×4’s are reused in building the outbound aircraft pallets. Indianapolis was faced with a problem of how to dispose of the surplus wood. While recycling was always an option, the thought was that someone somewhere could repurpose the wood for a good cause. It was just a matter of finding a company that could reuse them.

A call was made to the local Habitat for Humanity office to see what use this organization may have for the 2×4’s. The Habitat Organization was very excited about the possibility of getting the wood. They could use it on various projects or sell it in their ReStore. If the wood could be resold, Habitat for Humanity would use the money towards funding other projects.

In the initial load, Schenker provided Habitat with 900 2×4’s equaling 13,500 pounds of lumber. Three months later, we provided another 450 2×4’s equaling 6,750 pounds. If volumes in the aircraft maintain, Schenker Indianapolis will continue to support Habitat quarterly.

Habitat for Humanity ReStore is a home improvement thrift store that sells new or gently-used items donated by individuals and companies. Greater Indy Habitat for Humanity unites the community with people in need to provide the life-changing opportunity to purchase and own quality, affordable homes. All proceeds benefit Habitat’s mission.

Chicago Diverts Tons of Recyclables from Landfill

Can you imagine 28,946 lbs. of paper; 18,947 lbs. of cardboard; 94,071 lbs. of wooden pallets; and 25,100 lbs. of steel all being carted away to your local garbage landfill site? Well, the Chicago Branch Warehouse division devised a plan to help save our planet, save money and reduce Chicago’s waste output.

Since the summer of 2013, Nada Hana (Maintenance Manager & Environmental Contact), along with the Chicago Branch Warehouse Team, started looking into options to reduce their carbon footprint and recycle most of the shipping materials that are delivered to their branch. Nada started to inquire with local vendors to find out which companies would pick up paper, electronics, styrofoam, plastics, cardboard, batteries, light bulbs, toner, wooden pallets, steel and wax paper.

Once she located local companies that would come and pick up these items, and in return provide a certification that these items would safely be recycled, the Chicago Warehouse Team began to stockpile 107 metric tons of items. They are saving the planet from greenhouse gases and carbon emissions, all the while saving our company money.

“Once we got started recycling paper, batteries and plastics, we then looked into ways to recycle almost all shipping materials that arrive at our office,” says Nada. “I started to inquire with more companies to see what other items we could store and recycle each month. We’ve begun holding monthly meetings to continue to find green ways to reduce our Carbon Footprint.” Nada has also signed up with her local Environmental Protection Agency to seek out ideas and suggestions on how the Chicago Branch can be even more proficient.

107 metric tons of recycled material translates into approximately 118 tons of landfill space that Chicago is saving. What are you and your branch doing to help reduce, reuse, and recycle? Please send your details to the Environmental Team in Freeport. We can all do our part for the future.

This branch also  started recycling their cigarette butts with a company called TerraCycle… all the cigarette waste we ship will be upcycled by their team of scientists and designers into new products. Each shipment will also net us TerraCycle points, which we can put towards funding a charity of our choice.

Info on program: http://www.terracycle.com/en-US/brigades/cigarette-waste-brigade.html

Nate Nahler was the employee from ORD that initially came across this program. He’s available for questioning if you have further questions. Attached you’ll find a pic of Nate and his colleague Briana Menchhofer getting the cigarette waste ready for recycling.

Schenker Boosts ISO Certified Facilities to 39!

As of February 2014, 39 US Schenker, Inc. facilities have been awarded the ISO 14001 certification. Just one year ago, only two facilities held the certification: Freeport and JFK. We are very proud of our achievement, as it places us among a handful of Freight Forwarding / Logistics companies worldwide to be ISO 14001 certified.

Getting to the point where a facility can undergo the necessary audit to become ISO certified involves more than just a pile of binders with policies in them. It’s only possible with the commitment and hard work of many people in the organization.

A key success factor for Schenker was having a truly dedicated management team and staff that were absolutely committed to achieving and maintaining the designation. A special thanks to the offices that were audited this year: Hartford, Orlando, Indianapolis, Minneapolis, Chicago, Moline, JFK and Freeport. The DNV (Det Norske Veritas) auditor assigned to us was very impressed with the involvement and awareness of our employees and management.

One of the major requirements to obtaining certification is having an Environmental Management System (EMS) in place. We took our already established EMS and made some upgrades, creating the new Lean EMS Interface back in 2012. This replaced the traditional Environmental Policy Manual and gave users a simple-to-use flow chart design, with immediate access to all of our environmental programs, policies, processes and forms. The response from the field was very positive. With the training and continued support from Environmental Management, users were equipped with the knowledge and know-how to wow any auditor that crossed their paths… and they did just that!

The fact that we made this investment, indicates our commitment to continually monitor, manage, and improve our environmental performance. We must show that:

• We have identified significant environmental aspects of our operations. We currently monitor Electricity and Heating Gas use, and Paper Consumption.
• We are taking steps to control these aspects. We have Energy / Waste monitoring tools that we utilize (Environmental Data Reports, TORCH).
• And that those steps are proving effective. We review Environmental Data Reports quarterly.

Besides training employees, and utilizing green practices around the workplace, we plan on continually improving our environmental performance by adding transparency to the quarterly sustainability figures submitted by the branches. By getting creative with contests and rewarding offices for their energy achievements, we predict nothing but great things for our sustainable future.

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