We consider sustainability at every stage of making and delivering newspapers. Our newspapers are printed using responsibly sourced materials, renewable energy from our own solar panels and processes designed to minimise waste. Read more about how we reduce our environmental impact below.

Paper

All of our papers are FSC-certified and sourced from producers that have met a strict set of environmental and socially responsible standards.

Certifications are used to ensure paper is produced from environmentally friendly sources. The key ones are:

• EU Ecolabel - an EU label of environmental excellence awarded to products and services that meet high environmental standards
• FSC - the Forest Stewardship Council is a global non-profit organisation that sets the standards for what is a responsibly managed forest
• PEFC - an international non-profit, non-governmental umbrella organisation that endorses national forest certification systems
• Blue Angel - the ecolabel of the German government
• Carbon Balanced Paper scheme - a carbon offsetting scheme set up by the World Land Trust to measure and reduce, before offsetting residual carbon emissions.

We offer a wide range of paper types. Every paper type we use has at least two of these certifications:

• 45gsm salmon - made by Holmen from a mix of mechanically pulped virgin fibre and recycled paper. FSC and PEFC certified
• 52gsm recycled - our most popular traditional paper is 100% recycled and made from UK-sourced recycled material. It's made in Kings Lynn by Palm Paper only 60 miles away from our printer. FSC, PEFC and Blue Angel certified
• 55gsm improved - we source our 55gsm improved paper from two different mills - Stora Enso and Holmen. Made from renewable virgin fibre. EU Ecolabel and FSC certified
• 70gsm improved - made by Holmen from mechanically pulped, virgin fibre. EU Ecolabel, FSC and PEFC certified
• 80gsm bright - made by Arctic Paper from chemically pulped, virgin fibre. FSC and PEFC certified
• 80gsm bright recycled - made by Denmaur from 100% post-consumer waste. FSC and Carbon Balanced Paper certified

Toners and inks

Our digitally-printed newspapers use toner made by Xeikon with 100% certified green energy. It is free from solvents and VOCs (volatile organic compounds), is odourless and food-approved. It is also de-inkable, meaning the newspaper can be completely recycled to create new newsprint.

Our traditionally-printed newspapers use standard coldset web offset inks. Vegetable-based inks are being developed for newspaper printing but do not currently provide the same quality. We hope to adopt them in the future.

Energy consumption

We have solar panels installed on the roof at our printing press. In 2025, they generated 107,250kWh of electricity – enough to print 67% of our orders (up from 59% in 2024).

Packaging

We use minimal plastic in our packaging. For digitally-printed orders, we’ve removed plastic strapping and packing tape.

For traditionally-printed orders, we are looking at innovative ways to remove packaging without damaging newspapers. For example, when we use boxes to ship your newspapers, we will place them loosely in the box rather than strapping and wrapping them in plastic (we do that for our larger digitally-printed orders). We are now offering compostable polybags and we are looking at compostable pallet wrap in the future.

Reducing waste

Printing newspapers can generate waste paper, whether it’s from running test prints to get the best results or trimming our minis and midis down to size.

We produce as little waste paper as possible and recycle all of it. Around 80% becomes recycled newsprint and the rest is shredded and turned into farm animal bedding (mostly for pigs and horses).

The aluminium plates used on our web offset press are recycled by J & G Environmental and become a variety of components including car parts.

Trees for life

We donate a portion of our annual profits to Trees For Life, a conservation charity working to rewild the Scottish Highlands. Every employee also gets a tree planted for their birthday. You can visit our grove to see how many trees we’ve planted since 2023.

Continuous sustainability

We’re always working to reduce our environmental impact and happy to answer any questions about the sustainability of our products – just write to us at newspaperclub@newspaperclub.com.