A ‘B Corp’, or a benefit corporation, is a company that’s part of a global economy that uses business as a force for good.

The B Corporation certification allows people like us to live our values through what we consume. It allows us to make purchasing choices with purpose.

A company with B Corp certification has been thoroughly assessed so you can be sure that its products and services, as well as all the behind-the-scenes workings, are in line with high environmental and social standards.

There are over 2,600 certified B Corporations across 150 industries in 60 countries to choose from. And that number is growing, with more and more businesses recognising the necessity to have a positive impact on society and the environment.

Getting the B Corp seal of approval

Here at Paper on the Rocks we gained our B Corp Certification back in June 2017. We received the certification after being successfully evaluated on pretty much everything we do. Our social and environmental performance was assessed, along with our supply chain, input materials, operations, public transparency, and how our business model impacts our team, community, the environment and our customers. It also, importantly, looked at how we balance our profit with a purpose that goes beyond making money.

B Corp plays a key role in encouraging for-profit companies to do business in a way that’s better for everyone. So, as you can see, it’s a pretty important community to be part of.

As a team, we’re personally big fans, and very proud, of Paper on the Rocks and its mission to improve the (currently incredibly wasteful) paper industry. And this is a big part of B Corp – working for one is more than a job. As cliché as it might sound, it’s also a passion.

How do we live our lives the B Corp way?

We love to support our fellow B Corporations, sometimes consciously, and sometimes it just happens without us even realising it.

I did a quick survey of the Paper on the Rocks team to see which B Corp products and services we use on a regular basis. It turns out we use a lot.

Of course, in our office, we use our own lovely Rockbooks to jot down our actions during meetings… As well as for essential personal scribbles like name ideas for hypothetical rock bands, shopping lists, and games of noughts and crosses.

But we thought we’d share the other companies we support on a daily basis with you in celebration of the awesome community that is B Corp. Any you’ve not heard of that you like the sound of? Be sure to check out their products and support organisations working towards a better world for all of us. Purchasing with purpose will make a difference.

So here it goes… (but first, please let us know about the B Corp companies you love!)

Food and drink

Ben & Jerry’s ice cream
Moyee coffee
Pukka tea
De Smaakspecialist (Smaakt) baking products
Tony’s Chocolonely chocolate

Hygiene

Method cleaning products
Yoni tampons and pads

Money matters

Pymwymic impact investors
Triodos bank

Out and about

Dopper drinking bottles
Fairphone mobile phones
Impact Hub co-working space
Patagonia outdoor gear
Snappcar peer-to-peer car and van rentals
Wakawaka solar powered light and chargers
Mud Jeans – jeans

Check out the B Corp Directory for a list of all benefit corporations to see how many you use, and what you might be missing out on.

By now you must have noticed that On The Rocks makes stationery from, amongst others, rocks. It sounds cool, we know, but we want to explain the production process a bit more in-depth.

For stone paper, you need two elements: 80% ground calcium carbonate and 20% non-toxic resin (HDPE).
That means that we can create paper out of waste! We use stone waste from old mines, building sites, any place you can imagine where the calcium carbonate normally lays to wait. Plus, a little bit of old bottles, plastic that was thrown away. Instead of piling it up in a big landfill, we re-use it in stone paper. Thus, we make an infinitely recyclable product, out of waste.

The calcium carbonate is ground to a fine powder and combined with the heated resin. Pneumatic systems work this process. The heated resin ‘glues’ the stone elements together.

This consistency is then blown up in the air, like a balloon. Imagine when you blow air into a balloon, the skin gets thinner and thinner. That’s the way stone paper is formed. Cilinders as high as tall buildings make sure there is enough room for the paper to rise up, until the right thickness (or thinness) is achieved. By pulling the paper up so high, it cools off at the same time. So when the paper cilinders have reached their highest point, the are pulled down again, and rolled up – ready for distribution!

As you can see, no cooling water, no toxins, no difficult drying techniques and most importantly – no trees, are used in this process.

Rockbooks are made from stone paper. Softcover Rockbooks are made from 100% stone paper. That means, from the cover to the pages on the inside: we only use stone paper. Hardcover Rockbooks have a cardboard cover, but are made from 100% stone paper apart from that.

Stone paper really is paper made from stone (waste). Now of course, this is a new and totally different material, compared to pulp paper. Not only is this paper very sustainable, it also has some specific characteristics. We’d like to tell you a bit more about them!

Unique characteristics of stone paper

1. Waterproof

The paper is completely waterproof! You can spill your water, coffee or red wine (tried and tested!) over the sheets of your Rockbook, and nothing will happen to your notes. You just wipe the liquids off, and continue writing.

2. Different density

The stone paper is slightly more see-through than pulp paper. The density of the paper is different compared to pulp paper. That is also the reason why, in some of our Rockbooks, especially the lighter versions, you see a little bit of our logo shimmering through. Actually kind of nice, because people immediately notice that you are not using a notebook made from trees!

3. Tear-resistant

Have you tried ripping apart a piece of stone paper? It is do-able, but not so easy! Pulp paper tears very easily, and that’s not the case with stone paper. This material is more sturdy. I mean, what else do you expect from stones, right ;-).

4. Colder

When you pick up your Rockbook, you might notice that it feels a bit colder than normal paper. Well, that’s really the stone you are feeling. This is a natural product, and thus very adaptive to cold circumstances.

5. Heavier weight

The reason our Rockbooks are a bit thinner than your average notebook, is because stone paper is almost twice the weight of normal paper. Perfect for all of your heavy thoughts. And your muscle building. You just feel that this book is made from stones.

6. Not easy to fold

On our softcover Rockbooks, you might notice that the cover tends to pop open a little bit. This is not a matter of a wrong fold, or too light of a fold. It’s a characteristic of the paper. Stone paper is not so easy to fold. The paper loves smooth folds, not too sturdy. It moves in mysterious ways…

7. Soft writing

Pencils and ballpoints work very well on the paper. It makes for really soft writing. Fountain pens take a long time to dry. Because the paper does not absorb the ink so fast, it will no ‘bleed’ so much on the paper when you write or draw on it.

8. Natural white color

The color of the paper, is actually the color of the stones that are used! So if you used, for example, oyster shells, the paper would be a bit more grey-toned. Since we use mainly old limestone at the moment, the paper becomes lightly yellow-white.

These are some characteristics of stone paper, and our Rockbooks in particular! What are your experiences with your Rockbook? Which pens work best, and what differences compared to pulp paper did you notice?

Here at On The Rocks, we are big fans of writing with pen and Rockbooks. Not much to your surprise, we assume. However, what might surprise you is the amount of research done on the benefits of writing as compared to typing a text on a computer or electronic device. And even more, the findings.

Let us enlighten you on the benefits of writing with pen and paper, sharing is caring!

Train your brain

The act of writing is a highly complex motorical exercise. Not only are you moving your hand to write, and thus your brain is directing your hand. At the same time your brain and muscles are remembering and recalling the letters you write. Plus, you have to come up with the words you want to write. So the areas in the brain responsible for thinking, language, memory and muscle movement are activated all at the same time! Now if you compare that to the act of typing, you don’t have to remember how to write a letter, or how to put it on paper. It’s way less difficult for your brain thus generates less brain activity. There even are suggestions that it might be beneficial for the elderly to continue writing on paper as they grow older, to train the brain.

An emotional connection

Everybody’s handwriting is different. It’s a very intimate thing, when you come to think of it. You are the only one handwriting in your exact way. Not to forget, that handwriting also can reflect emotions. Now in digital writing, that emotion is replaced by emoticons, by bold and italic letters. But none of those can replace the way you write letters directly inserting emotion in them. By making them a bit more frivolous, bigger or smaller in a sentence, curly or straight strokes. What’s also missing from most digital texts, are the corrections and creative process of adjusting a text. To keep this visible can show what the author was thinking at the time of writing, what he deemed not correctly displaying his emotions or thoughts. Thus giving you a much closer connection with the writing, because you get a small insight into his thinking and the nuances he intentionally made to the text.

Remembering better

Note taking with a pen and paper instead of a computer, helps you better digest and remember the information you were listening to. Since it is not possible to literally write down a whole lecture for example, you have to immediately rephrase the information into your own words and filter out only the crucial parts. When you are taking notes on a computer, it is way easier to almost literally type down what you’ve just heard. After a lot of research on this topic, the message seems clear for students and other people wanting to remember lectures et cetera: write your notes with pen and paper.

Prevent from online distraction

Another benefit which is clear I think for anyone, is the lack of online distractions when you are not using a digital device. There can be complete silence surrounding you. The only thing you need are your own thoughts, pen and paper. You can see this also as an exercise for true introspection. No need for input from the outside world. Status updates. E-mails. Different fonts. Music. It’s just you. Only thinking of it makes us relax.

These were the benefits of writing with pen and paper. If you have any additional comments, please feel free to share!

In this post, we’re focusing on deforestation in the name of paper production. What is deforestation? What’s so bad about it? And what can we do to help?

This is the first in a series of blogs looking at the impact of the paper industry on our environment. We’ll be covering some of the big issues and questioning if, and how, we can rebalance our friendship with trees.

Paper. Even in this digital era, it’s rare that a day goes by without us interacting with a product made from wood pulp: a paper cup, till receipts, a cereal box, tickets, tissues, fancy shopping bags, sticky notes, newspapers, books, magazines…

14% of deforestation is done to satisfy our huge appetite for paper goods.

Some of these items are steadily becoming outdated in favour of digitalisation, at least in some parts of the world. As we move into the thick of the 21st century many of us have trained ourselves to stop before printing out emails (seriously people!). But it’s still hard to imagine our lives without certain paper products. And the truth is about 14% of deforestation is done to satisfy our huge appetite for paper goods [1]. This amounts to the destruction of around 4.1 million hectares of forest each year in the name of our paper obsession – an area the size of the Netherlands every 365 days.

This amounts to the destruction of around 4.1 million hectares of forest each year in the name of our paper obsession.

At Paper on the Rocks we do not find this acceptable. Do you? Not sure? Read on to discover why we want to put an end to deforestation and create a healthy paper industry.

What is deforestation? And why do we do it?

Deforestation is the clearing of vast areas of trees, largely as a result of human activities. But why? Here are just a few of the excuses we use to destroy forests (and often, the plant and animal species that live among them):

Clearing land for agriculture so we can plant Oil Palms (to produce palm oil), Soybeans (to produce food for ourselves, and to feed livestock with various soy products), and other crops
Creating space for cattle ranches in response to the increasing global demand for beef
Expanding urban areas, build new transport routes and housing developments
And, of course, providing the paper industry with wood pulp to turn into paper and cardboard products, our focus today.

What’s so bad about deforestation and, in turn, the paper industry?

Our biodiversity depends on forests

The majority of the world’s biodiversity (the huge array of insects, birds, mammals, reptiles, amphibians, plants and trees) lives in, and depends on, forests. This is where it’s evolved over hundreds of thousands of years. Deforestation can wipe out huge swathes of this incredible richness within a matter of moments. According to the WWF’s recent Living Planet report, the current levels of deforestation make the species living in our rainforests some of the most endangered in the world.

Deforestation can wipe out huge swathes of this incredible richness within a matter of moments.

Forests soak up carbon dioxide and feed us with oxygen

Trees keep us alive. They create the oxygen we breathe and remove and store harmful carbon dioxide, helping to reduce global warming. We are utterly dependable on them. It’s as simple as that.

Deforestation releases more carbon into the atmosphere

As mentioned above, trees store carbon dioxide, which is released when cutting them down, burning them or making them into pulp for paper production. And, as you might expect, this contributes to global warming. Scientists estimate that 23% of man-made carbon dioxide emissions are as a result of the loss of forests [2]. This is far more than the amount created by all the cars and lorries on our roads, estimated at 14% by the World Car-free Network.

But replacing the richness of an older forest (…) with fast growing monocultures, fuelled by desire to make money, can have devastating effects.

Growing new forests isn’t the same as saving naturally established forests

Sure, offsetting the destruction of centuries old forests by growing new ones is better than doing nothing at all. In some cases. When we grow new forests thoughtfully, with biodiversity at the forefront, and when we then protect these trees from further deforestation.

But replacing the richness of an older forest’s biodiversity and high-quality soil with fast growing monocultures (lots of one type of tree all growing side by side), fuelled by desire to make money, can have devastating effects.

For example, the deadly forest fires Portugal has endured over the last few summers are largely caused by the planting and mismanagement of Eucalyptus trees. These trees are fast growing, great for cutting down to make wood pulp, but terrible for biodiversity because they make it very hard for other types of trees to grow alongside them, and even insects don’t like them. They’re also highly flammable due to their natural oils.

Sounds pretty bad, right?

So what can you do to help rebalance our friendship with trees? How can you offset deforestation in a meaningful way?

It’s not all doom and gloom – there are success stories (several can be found in this opinion piece in the Guardian) – and there are some big players determined to change things for the better, such as the Norwegian Government, which banned deforestation in 2016 [3].

But if we want things to change we all need to be involved – as individuals, citizens of the world, workers, business owners and politicians.

In each blog in this series, we’ll be suggesting a couple of ways for you to start making a difference. Here are two to start with:

Challenge yourself to go single-use paper free
Start with a week and see how long you can keep it going. This will mean refusing unnecessary packaging, leaflets and paper tickets. We’ve all been talking about using fewer single-use plastic products – the same goes for pulp and paper products.
Always ask questions
Buying something new? Whether it’s a t-shirt, notebook, piece of meat or pack of tofu, ask questions. Look for answers online, ask in store or contact the producer directly. Where did it come from? Was it made fairly, without human suffering and the unnecessary use of precious resources? If you’re not satisfied with the answers, is there a more sustainable alternative available?

Further reading

WWF’s recently released Living Planet Report 2018 looks at the importance of biodiversity, the impact of deforestation, and much more.
A New York Times’ report on Portugal’s forest fires in 2017, looking at the causes and the impact on local communities.
Greenpeace has information on their website about deforestation and how you can get involved in their campaigns.

References

[1] Industrial Environmental Performance Metrics, Challenges and Opportunities – The Pulp and Paper Industry (1999)

[2] The Guardian’s Ultimate Climate Change FAQ – How do trees and forests relate to climate change? (April 7, 2010)

[3] Ecowatch article: Norway becomes world’s first country to ban deforestation (June 8, 2016)

We don’t plant a tree for every notebook we sell, because it does not contribute to solving the root cause of the paper problem.

We face large scale deforestation and biodiversity loss due to too much pressure on our natural resources in general. To offer you a tree planted for every notebook you buy, is a misplaced band-aid. We create a healthy paper industry for you instead.

In the past we have considered to plant a tree for every book sold. The only reason we would do something like that would be for marketing purposes. The ‘buy one give/plant one’ model is a business strategy to make people feel good about their purchase immediately. It is often times a quick serotonin fix for the buyer and good revenue for the seller (here is an insightful article on the difficulty of such ‘one for one’ models and their unintended consequences). It distracts from the difficult route we must walk to truly solve the most pressing issues. That is not a quick fix. It is not a walk in the park. It is a serious endeavour that (yes this also frustrates me) takes years.

The environmental damage done during production of an item you purchase, or a trip you make, cannot be repaired by planting a tree on the other side of the planet. A tree takes multiple years to start storing even a little CO2. It takes up to 500 years to restore biodiversity in a forest. So the positive effect of planting one tree, takes a long time to come into fruition. If ever (a lot of tree saplings die, it’s considered natural).

Inevitably, the production of a product leads to pressure on one or multiple natural resources. Amongst others by felling trees. The best we can do is create a healthy production industry, keep the trees we already have where they belong (in the ground, mostly), and downscale the amount of products we produce in general.

Large scale tree planting initiatives do also not always live up to the promises. Plantations are created for CO2 sequestration but often times also have a commercial goal, for example ‘selective logging’. Which is understandable, but it doesn’t offer us a restoration of biodiversity. As clearly explained in this article, “helping biodiversity doesn’t offer the financial return of carbon storage or timber markets.” The trees are a revenue model, not an entity on itself or part of the system. And the good news is, a forest restores itself, when it is left at peace, that is called ‘natural regeneration’.

There lies a responsibility for companies and their marketing departments to inform their supporters, customers and fans, about what it really takes to create change and a healthy planet. And what the company does to contribute to restore biodiversity and halt deforestation.

That is why at Paper on the Rocks, we research, develop, and scale up paper made from alternative resources like waste streams. That way we reduce the pressure on our forests and create an industry not as reliant on a huge supply of trees, water and energy as is currently the case.

Thus if you buy a notebook from Paper on the Rocks, you directly contribute to repairing a root cause of these problems we face. We promise to not give you a quick fix, or a band-aid.

We solve the real problem. And will continue to do so in the long run.

 

For people, paper is emotion. Emotion in the writing that covers the pages, but also sentimental emotion in the paper itself. What does it feel like, how does it look? Wrinkle? Smell?

What most of us are not aware of, is what is actually in our paper. Some papers are white, some are more brown-ish, some are loaded with fibers or even pieces of old jeans, tulips, or shredded money. In short, there is a whole world of different paper types that are equally fascinating – but when it comes to their impact on our environment, looks can be deceiving.

There are roughly three types of paper production that can be identified in the world of graphic paper (the paper that we print and write on).

Wood-based paper
This paper is currently the most commonly used graphic paper. It can look super white (most likely bleached), or a little brown-ish. It comes in different weights. Some have an FSC certificate (or a mixed FSC certificate, which means it is a mix of non-FSC and FSC certified wood pulp). The wood will usually come from eucalyptus, or pine trees. Sometimes an alternative source of fibers is used as a filler for these paper types, thus resulting in a paper that is up to 20% alternative fibers and 80% wood-based pulp.
Wood-free paper
This type of paper is still a rarity on the market. Mainly because it is much more difficult to find and process fibers (or other base materials) that stick together to create paper you can write or print on. Of course it is essential that this type of paper is easy to use, holds its shape and looks like the paper we are accustomed to. Wood-free paper consists of either pulped alternative fibers, like agricultural waste or grass, or a mineral that is in essence glued together by a binder ingredient, like stone paper.
Decor paper
This is considered a specialty paper. Decor paper has been around for ages. It is used because of its pretty looks which at time can look stunning. It is created by mixing wood pulp with another ingredient during the paper production process. What is mixed in can range from old jeans, to cotton, to seeds, beets that are shredded and thrown in the mix. Imagine it like blending a smoothie, where you add a spoonful of seeds afterwards to make it look pretty. The reason why you can so easily spot the special ingredients in the paper, is because they are not pulped and cooked. That results in a pretty look, but is not the reason why a material can function as paper. The main relevant ingredient in these paper types is wood pulp. Decor paper becomes paper because of the wood pulp that functions as a basis for holding the alternative ingredients together.
There is some innovation in this area, where wood-free paper functions as the binder of the specialty fibers. Good news!

Currently there are many types of paper on the market that claim they are eco friendly, better for the environment and protect biodiversity. There is a lack of transparency in the production chains. That can be harmful to the industry as a whole. Sometimes eco paper is just decor paper going by a different name. Some proclaimed wood-free paper is actually recycled paper – where virgin fibers are still an essential ingredient, and the basis of the pulp is still wood.

When you are buying a paper product, don’t hesitate to ask. What is in this paper? What is it made of?