Innovation

M&L work with the UN’s Sustainable Goals as well as their individual sustainable goals on a daily basis, and the company combine these goals with their more traditional business goals in a natural way. By providing the means necessary, they have created a strong, steady company that grows each year.

Inspiration

Even though Mårdskog & Lindkvist is a profit-driven company, they also show an interest in social entrepreneurship. They want to stay updated regarding social and environmental issues and aim to contribute to a better world and society in the best way possible. Social entrepreneurship focuses on opportunities that create social value which M&L does by their involvement in UN’s Sustainable Development Goals. It is described that it is possible for a company to combine both commercial and social entrepreneurship. In this case, the company follows two bottom-lines, one that focus on profits and the other on social value. This concept describes the mind-set of M&L.

Overall impact

As a firm, M&L actively strives for gender equality and to achieve this open-minded atmosphere there is a clear statement within the company that all employees and interviewees should be treated as a person, and not different based on being a man or a woman. M&L also aims to participate in goal number two, end hunger and guarantee food security, as well, even if it is perhaps more suitable to consider them as a preventer of hunger in a secondary stage. Like many other firms in Sweden, M&L has decent working conditions and each employee has automatically a valid collective agreement from their very first day at work.

One of the primary development goals of M&L is their effort in sustainable consumption and production. The organization has a detailed environmental management system where the company strives towards doing more and better, with as little impact on the environment as possible. Policies regarding environmental issues clarify that they constantly aim to improve their sorting of waste, minimize their use of non-renewable resources, increase their usage of environmental friendly vehicles and that they provide alternatives that are ecological support-labeled. Previous goal can also be directly connected to UN's goal of taking urgent action to climate changes and its impact. M&L has detailed policies that constantly are under improvement so that minimizing the environmental impact and unnecessary use of resources can be planned as detailed as possible.

Business benefit

The business benefits can be defined by focusing on the UN goals where they strive for equality, food security, economic growth, sustainable consumption and combat climate change. These goals could all be described in one word; sustainability. While working for a better future, M&L are constantly developing to reach their goals. Hjort states that the size of the business restricts their abilities to reach their fullest potential regarding UN sustainable development goals. The ultimate solution would include employees that only focuses on these topics. The company is aware that their organization is not big enough for positions where only these questions would be considered. M&L shows a deep understanding for what flaws their business has and also what would be required to correct them.

Social and environmental benefit

It is important for companies to be aware of the environment and how to strive for the best way to apply triple bottom line in daily operations, because of the various business benefits that comes with it. As cited in lecture two of this course, CSR can increase the company’s revenue and productivity, reduce the use of energy, water supply and materials as well as reduce the risk in different processes. Therefore, Mårdskog & Llindkvist have started to implement small changes at their offices, to reach a better structure within the triple bottom line. For instance, they came up with a new system for their printer where each employee got their own printer-card. This action forces the employees to leave their offices to swipe their card before printing their documents. Additionally, they use a new IT-system at the warehouse which makes the truck drivers receive their orders in an electronic system, instead of paper format. Furthermore, Mårdskog & Lindkvist started to use a type of paper that is environmentally friendly for the magazine they deliver to their customers once a month. These adjustments were the first steps for the company regarding working for a better result within the triple bottom line. Each change might seem small but in the end, they will make a big difference.

Interview

Berit Hjorth, CFO