I (Bryce Tarling) was asked to put together a brief interview with the company to learn more about what the company does to promote sustainability. Check out the interview with Richard below!

Q: Tell us a bit about Hemlock Printers..

Hemlock is a family-owned print communications company employing 160 staff who mostly work at our head office and manufacturing plant in Burnaby. We also operate 3 sales offices in Victoria, Seattle and San Francisco. We take great pride in the final printed products that leave our doors each day, as we have for the past 43 years. Our clients range from designers, artists, photographers, publishers, corporate clients as well as the public sector – basically anyone that may need print services.

The constant evolution of our print and media services shows that meeting change is part of our DNA. Digital printing and web-development are two of our emerging services that have quickly become key to our business as we adapt to the changing needs of our customers. Thanks to ongoing input from our dedicated staff, we’ve also incorporated sustainability initiatives throughout our business with tangible results that we’ve formally reported on for the past 3 years. Our environmental practices have led to Hemlock being recognized as Canada’s Most Environmentally Progressive Printer for the past 5 years and in 2008 we were also awarded Most Sustainable Printing Company by Heidelberg, the worlds largest press manufacturer.

Q: What goes into making Hemlock Printers a carbon neutral company?

Our efforts to make our plant and offices more energy efficient on an ongoing basis and our commitment to purchase annual clean energy technology offsets equal to our operationally controlled emissions are the foundation to our Carbon Neutral statement. We find the total operational greenhouse gas impact that sets our offset purchase amount by annually inventorying our emissions from direct fuel use (scope 1), electricity consumption (scope 2), and all the necessary third party services that go into producing our finished product (scope 3).

Q: How did you get involved with Projecting Change?

We are close collaborators with our design friend, Brady Dahmer and we’ve been aware of the festival through the local sustainability networks for several years, and have been excited to see it growing to what it is today. The rest is history.

Q: Tell us a bit about why you think an event like the Projecting Change Film Festival is important.

It’s important for everyone to understand sustainability and not to feel intimidated by it. Film is a great medium for entertaining audiences while also showing them the changes that others like them have made, the ways that their actions affect the world around them, and the systems that make and prevent sustainability, all without cracking a textbook. Film festivals are also gatherings, perfect to get people talking and thinking together.

Q: What can individuals do to work towards sustainability or to help project change?

First, people should start looking for options to help reduce their environmental and social impacts. They will soon find others interested in these topics as they adopt new habits, and will naturally become examples for making sustainable changes in their communities. Even if all they do at first is to invite a friend to Projecting Change, life is about how we project the change we want to see.

Find out a little bit more about Hemlock…

Trailer For Hemlock Printers The Movie (We Joke)

Issue 04 from Inventory Magazine on Vimeo.

Have you spotted a Projecting Change 2011 flyer or poster around town? Grab a happy snap (picture) and upload it to our facebook wall – bonus points for sneaky/humorous locations! Catch you at the festival.

- Bryce @BryceTarling