An article about sustainable green printing you never asked for but we wrote it anyway – Rich Boland, Client Services, Precision Group
This is a blog article about a certification renewal. Our Level 3 green printer certification has been renewed. Please contain your excitement.
I would like to acknowledge, up front, that this is not a thrilling premise. If you’re reading this on a Tuesday afternoon looking for something to make you feel differently about your working week, I’m sorry. Come back next month. We might have a story about a butterfly. Actually we have done that.
But if you’re still here, I have a small thesis to share. Which is this. Green Tape is better than Red Tape.
Making the case
Everyone hates Red Tape. Fair enough. Red Tape is the paperwork you fill out and little happens. Green Tape is the paperwork you fill out and, at the end, an auditor from the Visual Media Association tells you that your Level 3 green printer certification has been renewed and, incidentally, you are still the only Level 3 we have in Victoria.
I know which one I prefer.
This is our third successful audit at Level 3. As of this week, Precision Group is one of a handful of printers certified at Level 3 in Australia. Said that before and I am reliably told you’ll now remember it.
What green printer certification involves
I would love to tell you that a Level 3 renewal is a matter of turning up with the right hi-vis vest and looking sincere. Nope.
At Level 1, you demonstrate that you handle waste, compliance and record-keeping properly. Level 2 adds energy, water, emissions, and chemical storage. Level 3 adds carbon reporting, the adoption of renewables, and a supplier audit trail that stretches back through your paper stock, your ink, and I am told (because it never crossed my mind before), the chain of custody on the pallet wrap.
To satisfy the auditor, you need documentation that ties out. Waste reconciled against actual production, not assumptions. Solar output normalised against throughput, so the number reflects efficiency rather than sunshine. Emissions measured across scopes 1, 2 and 3. Records that survive a spot-check twelve months later. It is, in short, a lot of work. A similar amount it took us to earn ISO 14001 too. Ahem.
The people who quite enjoy the spreadsheets
This is where I need to introduce you to some of my colleagues.
Cory Hall, our founder, has cared about this stuff for years. Matt Gatfield runs our compliance, systems and environmental reporting, which sounds like three jobs because it is. Dave Arvaji and Kit Loi build the internal tools that make sure the numbers we’re reporting are actually the numbers coming out of the production floor, and not a hopeful approximation.
Between them, they are the people who make our green printer certification real.
I want to be careful about how I say the next bit, because it can easily come across as a humble brag, and this is a genuine industry with a lot of businesses doing genuine work. But here is the truth of it.
Our team does not chase the certification for the badge. They chase it because they think this is what a modern printing business ought to do. If tomorrow the VMA introduced a Level 4, they would spend Wednesday morning working out what it takes to get there.
What green printer certification means for a buyer
If you are a marketer, a procurement lead, or a communications director choosing a printer in Melbourne in 2026, there is a reasonable chance your organisation has a sustainability target it needs to hit. And a scope-3 emissions figure it needs to be able to defend.
Certified suppliers make that job easier, because the paperwork behind the badge means the numbers you inherit from us are numbers you can put in front of your board.
That is the whole practical case for Green Tape.
If you’d like the longer version, we’ve written about the sustainability programme here, and about how print and mail integration works with sustainable production here. Both are less “interesting” than this one, but more useful if you’re actually building a supplier case.
Talk to us
Precision Group holds Level 3 green printer certification from the Visual Media Association and ISO 14001 environmental management certification. We are, additionally, quite happy to walk you through the spreadsheets. Contact our team at info@thepg.com.au, or visit thepg.com.au/services/print.
