Environmental Statement


Throughout our business, from start to finish, House of Marbles is committed to making positive changes to lessen our impact on the environment around us. As a family-run Devonian company, we are lovers of our natural environment. We care about the world around us and the world that we are leaving for our children and grandchildren to come.

Though, we may be small, we appreciate that even minor adjustments to our processes can make a big difference to the impact we have on the environment. In this statement we will outline the steps we are currently taking as a business to improve our environmental impact whilst acknowledging that this is an ever-changing subject and we will adapt and modify our practices year on year as further opportunities for improvement arise.

Our commitment to environmentally friendly practices is shared throughout our business and with our staff and each area of House of Marbles has been charged with looking at how we can minimise any negative impact. From our restaurants to our offices, from toy design to delivery, we are working as a team to bring you high quality toys and games that will stand the test of time and not hurt our planet in the process.

For Our Trade Range:

We have made a commitment to reducing the use of single-use plastic in our product packaging throughout our range. Removing all plastic overnight is impossible, but with each new product designed or re-ordered from our suppliers, we are making modifications and redesigning to remove/minimise plastic wherever we can. From replacing polystyrene inserts with recycled cardboard and removing unnecessary plastic bag wrapping inside boxes, we are making positive changes all the time. We use compostable void fill inside the boxes we use for our deliveries, and it is 100% compostable.

Where plastic is unavoidable, we are actively sourcing biodegradable options.

As a traditional toys and games company, many of our products are made of wood. We identify this as a key area in which to be as environmentally responsible as possible and as such, we are keen to use wood from Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certified suppliers.

FSC certified wood products are from regulated and certified producers, ensuring that the environmental as well as human impact of the wood production is sound and ethical. If you would like to read more about the FSC certification programme you can do so here https://www.fsc-uk.org/en-uk/about-fsc. With wooden toys new to our range we are ensuring FSC compliance and with older products we will gradually move towards FSC compliant suppliers as further orders are placed.

In Our Offices:

We recycle all paper waste as well as ink cartridges and are aware of efficiencies that we can make by double-side printing our documents for example.

In terms of administration however, our main focus is to digitise our practices, moving increasingly towards a paperless office.

In Our Warehouse:

Wherever possible we try to use more environmentally responsible packing materials which we vary to the packing needs of the product. Whether it be plastic air-pillows which reduce waste in general terms (and which are treated with an accelerant to speed biodegradability) or recycled paper void filler or corn-starch packing ‘peanuts’ for our Teign Valley Glass Studio products, we are constantly trying to improve our impact on the environment whilst keeping our products competitively priced.

All boxes used for shipping our products are made from recycled cardboard.

We are actively seeking cost effective alternatives to other packaging essentials such as tape and box strapping.

In Our Retail Sites and Restaurants:

We use a local waste disposal contractor who adheres to the ‘Zero to Landfill’ scheme. This means, in short, that all waste from our kitchens is composted and some is used to create Green energy at a local waste processing site. Anything that cannot be composted is recycled as locally as is possible.

We use compostable plastic or paper carrier bags in our retail shops.

Teign Valley Glass Studio is moving over to using electric furnaces and production equipment which are far more energy efficient and reduces our overall energy consumption. With a change towards energy from suppliers who utilise renewable sources over the next 12 months, this will go further towards improving our environmental impact.