Who Gives a Crap unveils solar powered warehouse

Who Gives a Crap is a sustainability focused company that makes recycled and bamboo toilet paper and donate 50 percent of profits to help build toilets in the developing world. Founded in Melbourne in 2012 and launched via an Indigogo crowdfunding campaign, the brand started shipping globally in 2019 and saw huge demand due to the covid induced toilet paper shortages. Its available both online and in over 900 Woolworths stores and over 580 Aldi stores across Australia. As of this year, the business has donated $11 million to improve sanitation and help build toilets in developing countries.

The company is regarded for its innovative marketing campaigns including a sustainability focused campaign this year to ‘uncrap the world’ and raise awareness of climate issues, and a Valentines campaign that turned your ex’s love letters into toilet paper.

The most recent campaign is another climate focused move. Revealed last week, Who Gives a Crap has adorned its Melbourne Warehouse roof in solar panels spelling out “WE GIVE A CRAP!!”.

The solar panels, which power the property, are expected to enable to company to avoid producing 112 tonnes of carbon emissions each year.

The company’s head of sustainability, Elissa Foster said the move shows it’s possible for businesses in leased warehouses or buildings to install solar despite challenges. It took two years working with the building’s landlord and property manager, MCM Logistics, for the solar panels to be approved and installed, according to the company.

“We want to bust the myth that businesses can’t implement solar on their leased warehouses or buildings — we’ve proven that they can (and can even have some fun with it, like we have). We’re proud of the precedent our solar milestone sets for our community and we want to share our learnings to help other businesses make the transition,” says Elissa Foster, Head of Sustainability at Who Gives A Crap.

“We recognise there isn’t one solution that will reduce all of our emissions. This initiative is just one of our emissions reduction activities. We are planning to expand solar to all of our Australian warehouses within the next 12 months and have just launched the first ever electric vehicle toilet paper fleet. We’re also looking into end of life battery solutions to tie it all together,” she added.

Simon Griffiths, CEO and co-founder of Who Gives A Crap encourages other companies to make the move over to solar power also. “Most emissions are produced by the corporate sector — so if every single company can reduce their emissions, then we can finally get to a point where we start to significantly reduce our impacts on climate change,” he stated.

“Ultimately, it doesn’t matter how profitable your business is in the long run if we don’t have a world that’s worth living in. That means we all have a duty to rethink the relationship between profit and environmental impact, but in this instance we’ve been able to reduce costs and improve environmental impact – it’s absolutely win-win.”

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