What was your CSR strategy before contacting Sami?

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‍ CSR has always been an important subject for the EBRA group, and is an integral part of our DNA.

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Our internal CSR committee is managed directly by COMEX, and all our industrial directors have annual goals to improve our environmental and social impact.

This desire to constantly improve our impact is also driven by our shareholder, a banking group with a mission that is very committed to these challenges.

It is also this desire that made us want to go further than CSR policy driven by our group to structure an approach specific to our activity and our sector.

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Thus EBRA is the first regional daily press group (PQR) to have obtained the CSR label Positive Workplace 1 star in 2021, and for the entire group and its subsidiaries.

To continue in this dynamic of progress, we wanted to obtain the 2nd star of this certification, requiring the completion of a complete carbon footprint including the Scope 3.

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Have you already done a carbon assessment?

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The EBRA group measures and monitors its BEGES (scope 1 & 2 carbon balance) for more than 10 years, in particular to be able to integrate it into our shareholder's global carbon reporting and its extra-financial performance statement (DPEF).

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This carbon footprint already allowed us to define and manage goals to reduce our energy consumption.

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Calculate our Scope 3 was above all a voluntary approach to precisely measure the carbon impacts specific to our press sector and define improvement objectives for all entities.

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Why did you choose Sami?

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We compared various providers, including the main historical consulting firms.

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We unanimously selected Sami for 3 main reasons.

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First, the agility and simplicity of the approach, which allowed us to move quickly and save time on collecting the necessary information. The other actors seemed too established to us to have the flexibility we were looking for and to adapt to our needs.

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Then the online platform, which allows us to easily collaborate with all internal referees and keep track of all our history.

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And finally the support by our dedicated expert Alexis on the reduction of our emissions. It is ultimately the most important thing, taking stock is one thing but defining and implementing concrete actions is the most important for us. And the collaboration with Alexis is precious for that, always listening and available to help us move forward.

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The doubt we had was about Sami's experience and expertise, which is still a recent platform. Will the database and hindsight be enough?

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What I understood today is that what matters is above all the provider's ability to follow constantly evolving sector standards, which Sami does very well.

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What did you think of Sami?

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The shared platform is a real plus to allow us to collaborate effectively with all the people involved with us, and to centralize all information.

Everyone understands what their work contributes to and how that contributes to the overall process.

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Sami's expertise and the quality of the support simply made it possible to adapt to our sector of activity, which is essential to provide relevant reduction measures and recommendations.

From data collection to the format of reduction coaching, everything has been tailored to our needs and Alexis has always been the driving force behind the process.

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The platform and the results presented are always simple, fun and educational.

When Sami came to present the results of this assessment to COMEX, there were no questions. Not because the subject is not interesting, but because everything was fluid and understandable, even if it was the first carbon balance that was presented to them.

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What are the main lessons of your carbon footprint?

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We already had a good idea of the impact of our activities, but it was impossible to confirm it without carrying out this complete carbon footprint.

The work also made it possible to compare the impact of our different poles and our different entities with each other.

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The numerous comparisons provided by Sami were very useful in comparing us program category by program category to our sector of activity, and to understand which positions we were already well advanced and on which we still had work to do.

We identified that one of our industrial suppliers was very advanced in its environmental approach and that its products have a low carbon footprint. We will work to favor this type of supplier to reduce our carbon footprint.

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The results of our carbon footprint also allowed us to prioritize our actions to first target our main emission sources.

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What are the next steps before next year?

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We have started working on our main emission stations.

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Regarding our purchases, we have put in place a sustainable purchasing charter, asking our suppliers to provide us with their carbon footprint and to commit to adopting responsible practices.

To our great surprise, the reception was very favorable among our industrial customers, congratulating us for the approach. It is now a question of generalizing this charter to all our purchases.

We will then be able to favour the most committed suppliers with the lowest carbon footprint.

‍ Another big part of our action plan concerns buildings and their energy consumption.

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With the implementation of flexible working and teleworking, our premises are never fully occupied. It is therefore imperative for us to rationalize our real estate portfolio, in a carbon but also economic logic.

An action plan and objectives will be defined for each of our entities, deriving from the global objectives.

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We are also the only player in our sector to value our waste paper by working directly with a paper manufacturer. These papers are thus reused in the paper industry directly and not in cardboard or construction as is the norm, which is more financially attractive but, in our opinion, contributing to increasing the price of paper and the probability of a shortage.

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