B is for Benefit
With Vancouver Film Studios leading the way, we have dedicated ourselves to becoming a better business; for our employees, our customers, and the rest of the world.
But what does that even mean, to be a better business? We're on a mission to find out exactly what that is, and being a Certified B Corporation is part of that mission.
How We're Doing It
Here's just a few of the things we're doing to promote a healthy workplace, community, and world! Want to see more? Check out our full B Lab assessment with Vancouver Film Studios here.
SUPPORTING
OUR
EMPLOYEES
- Provide a living wage -
- Promote from within -
- Health benefits -
- Incentives for health & wellness activities -
- Paying our employees a living wage -
- Providing cross-skills training -
- Promoting from within -
- Offering incentives for health & wellness initiatives -
- Dispensing health benefits -
- Cross-skills training and facilitate for external professional development opportunities -
- RRSP Matching -
- Paid parental leave -
-Tuition reimbursement -
SUPPORTING
OUR
ENVIRONMENT
- Provide a living wage -
- Promote from within -
- Health benefits -
- Mandatory Carbon Literacy training for all of our employees -
- Carbon neutral since 2008! -
- Community Garden for all employees to use -
- Donating and sponsoring various eco-minded initiatives and charities (ex. REEL Green Earth Day, Still Creek Streamkeepers, & the Sustainable Production Forum)
- Incentives for health & wellness activities -
- Learn about more of our sustainability initiatives on our Sustainability Page -
- Cross-skills training and facilitate for external professional development opportunities -
-Tuition reimbursement -
SUPPORTING
OUR
COMMUNITY
- Provide a living wage -
- Promote from within -
- Health benefits -
- Incentives for health & wellness activities -
- Paid days off for staff to use for volunteering -
- Amended our recruiting process to conduct unbiased hiring -
- Sponsering local film festivals and production companies (ex. Crazy 8s, UBC POV, Primary Imaging, & COJAX Industries) -
- Donating gear to schools with film programs in need -
- Cross-skills training and facilitate for external professional development opportunities -
- Donating and sponsoring various community initiatives and charities (ex. Vancouver General Hospital, Take A Hike Foundation, Collingwood Neighbourhood House) -
-Tuition reimbursement -
Carbon Neutrality
Since 2008, we've proudly been a carbon neutral company.
Fuel consumption, particularly from generator use is the most wasteful element of film production. We decided in 2022 to look at the generator diesel usage from the productions we support and see just how wasteful it was. As you can see from our Impact Report, the usage of the generators alone last year emitted more CO2 into the atmosphere than the entirety of the rest of our company operations combined! This information will allow us to have more impactful conversations with our customers about how we can reduce this moving forward. We need to do better and work harder as an industry to find more sustainable solutions.
In 2022 we decided to support the Great Bear Rainforest project with Climate Smart. This project is located in the North and Central-Mid Coast and Haida Gwaii region of BC. This offset project supporters preserving ecologically and culturally rich landscapes and supports job creation in the area. For more information please see their website.
We believe we have a responsibility improve our environment and we are working hard to reduce the impact our industry has on it.
As a division of Vancouver Film Studios, we are following their example in making sustainability not only a core value within our business , but one of our top priorities. To that end, we have implemented multiple initiatives throughout all departments in our office and warehouse and are striving daily to become more environmentally and socially responsible.
In 2021, we officially became a Certified B Corporation™. As part of the B Corp certification process, we amended our legal governing documents requiring our Company to balance both profit and purpose. What this means is that we have put in place positive core practices beyond what is required by regulations, including an emphasis on the betterment of our environment.
Our Commitment
How we do it
What you can do as a production
Have we inspired you to try and make your sets greener? There are many ways you can reduce your carbon footprint. The following are just a few small ways you can help out:
- Hire craft services and catering services that use compostable containers, cutlery and plates. Encourage your cast and crew to bring their own reusable containers.
-Reduce or even ban plastic water bottles from set. (Set dec will also thank you for the reduction in empty bottles they have to clear from the set!)
-Rent LEDs instead of tungsten.
-Donate your props and set pieces to a reuse it centre like Keep it Green.
-Use recycling bins instead of garbage cans. Removing garbage cans will encourage (force) people to reduce their garbage.
-Encourage your production members to attend a Carbon Literacy Training session (its free!).
-Save and reuse or recycle old costumes or props/set pieces.
-Donate anything useful that you don't need to schools or microbudget productions.
-And...we might be a little biased on this one... RENT instead of buying!
Interested in learning more?
Check out the Vancouver Film Studios website for more info on our Sustainability initiatives.