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The Green House

In 2021, we launched an initiative designed to take ownership of our green waste and support the biodiversity around our HQ in innovative new ways.

This programme is dedicated to reducing green waste and making the most of the space and resources that are available to us as a business, thereby playing an active part in developing ideas and processes that will leave our entire industry cleaner and more efficient. But this goes beyond Arena Flowers HQ; we are creating a blueprint for ethical practice that will be open to all to learn from in coming years.

Our Three Pillars

Waste: Putting waste produced at our UK HQ and throughout our supply chain to its best, greenest use to make our business less wasteful.

We’re taking accountability of our green waste through finding innovative ways to reuse it. For some time we have been taking ownership of the green waste which is created as our flowers are grown and trimmed, using the off-cuts to create the paper in which we send our bouquets. In doing so, we created the world’s first closed-loop flower waste system.

In our direct operations, our search for green waste circularity means looking beyond composting. Previously we've trialled green waste as feed for the Black solider Fly run, an insect with surprisingly nutritious larvae, helping to product low-impact animal feed which has huge benefits for the planet. More recently we have been upcycling our waste rose petals, which are being used as an ingredient in conscious soaps. To really rive a circular economy we need to build strong partnerships with other industries, and that's what we'll continue to do.

Our search for green waste circularity introduced us to a tiny insect with surprisingly nutritious larvae, called the Black Soldier Fly, and to AgriGrub, the UK’s largest black soldier fly grub farmer. We’re working with AgriGrub to create the perfect mix of commercial flower off-cuts which can be used as feed for these special grubs and increase the space efficiency of the AgriGrub farms. Once perfected, our flowers will help to produce low-impact animal feed which has huge benefits for the planet.

Space: Making spaces at our UK HQ available for initiatives, people, projects, the local community and more.

This year we introduced what will become around 300,000 new workers to our site in the form of honey bees. Five colonies of apis mellifera are now being managed by a professional beekeeper, who is also training two of our colleagues to look after them. There are many benefits to these tenacious workers - chiefly that bees are our top pollinators. Every one in three mouthfuls we eat is only possible thanks to pollinators, and living nearby farmland is helping our local farmers, pushing the impact even beyond our local community. Pollination also increases the strength of the local ecology: stronger, nutritionally enhanced flora feeds more fauna, supporting the natural life cycles around us.

As well as helping our managed pollinators, we find numerous species of other wildlife around us at HQ, and we're in the process of transforming a number of our outdoor spaces to give this wildlife environmental support. The planting of native wildflowers has already seen insects of all shapes and sizes enjoy the pollen and nectar on offer, and shrubs, grasses and perennial flowers will support wildlife highways around our site. We've taken into consideration the management needed for the plants, and chosen species that will mostly take care of themselves, supporting nature in doing its thing with minimal human interference.

One of the larger-scale foundational projects is the establishment of the Arena Flowers Infinite Garden. An inspirational, educational space which will physically demonstrate our commitment to circularity.

This will be an area shared by the Arena Flowers team and our wider community, bringing biodiversity, wellbeing, incredible bursts of colour and opportunities for inspiration and education to our local area.

Innovation: Dreaming and developing, answering problems and challenging the accepted norms. The more ideas we have and the more people and projects we can support, the brighter the future we will create.

We’re proud to announce that we will be working with Cranfield University - one of the top ten UK universities for commercial research, consultancy and professional development - as part of The Green House initiative. We will be working closely with the School of Water, Energy and Environment to analyse our operations and map out further ethical innovations. To kick off the partnership, we are funding an MSc which can impact the sustainability of the cut-flower industry.

Learn more about the Green House in our 2021 Sustainability Report.

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