ESG Spotlight: HELLO!
ESG Spotlight: HELLO!
In 2023, HELLO! became the first publishing house in the UK to receive the ESGmark® certification. As an influential brand, HELLO! has shown that fostering positive impact, both internally and by inspiring their readership, is of key importance to their ongoing vision. HELLO! uses their platform for good, such as through their purpose-driven campaigns which support sustainability and wellbeing, and their ongoing actions to improve the environmental and social impact of their business. We spoke with Emily Hawkins-Longley, People Director at HELLO!, about their journey towards ESGmark® certification, the ESG challenges faced in their industry, and their recent and upcoming initiatives to better their impact.
ESGmark®: Tell us about HELLO! and about your role.
HELLO! is a market-leading lifestyle and celebrity publication, known for its positive and celebratory reporting and unrivalled showbiz exclusives which have been entertaining audiences since 1988. Over the years, its digital brand has transformed from a small legacy publishing site into an influential global website.
I have been at HELLO! for a year now, I was drawn to the positivity of the company and that HELLO! stories offer an element of escapism and fun for our readers. I've worked in HR for over 20 years, having the privilege to work for a number of different publications. My role at HELLO! draws on that experience and allows me to suggest changes and ideas in an environment that is ever evolving and open to progression.
As with any HR professional, you never know what your working day might bring. At HELLO! there's a mix of the standard procedures for example overseeing payroll and considering contractual changes, introducing new policies, mixed in with questions such as 'can we bring guinea pigs into the office for the morning?'. I'm often the person people go to if nobody else knows the answer.
ESGmark®: What sparked HELLO! to engage more closely with the ESG agenda?
HELLO! has always had an appetite to do more good with its platforms – we have a huge audience of lovely, highly engaged people – so it’s a big opportunity for us to lead conversations in the right way and with purpose. We launched our HELLO! to Kindness campaign in 2019, which encouraged people to be kinder in their everyday lives – whether in person or online. We could see the big difference our campaign made to our audience, and we were keen to do more. We know that the way that we all do business impacts a great many people, and we began to investigate the ESG agenda. We knew that anything we did in this arena needed to be audited by an external body who would hold us to higher standards – too many times, industries ‘mark their own homework’ - and so we started to have a conversation with ESGmark® about what is possible for a legacy publisher like us. For us, the crucial elements were to acknowledge that our commitment is an on-going journey and to be able to take our audience with us.
ESGmark®: Tell us about HELLO!’s ESG initiatives that you are proud of.
As a brand, we’ve been on the journey to a more sustainable business model for some time; making efforts to improve our print distribution to use recycled, recyclable and biodegradable packaging; reducing our carbon emissions and improving energy efficiency from desk to newsstand; prioritising supportive employment practises to attract and retain a happy, healthy team. Additionally, we launched the Planet Positive channel on hellomagazine.com to bring our audience with us on our ESG journey. Sharing stories that highlight the small changes you can make for a big difference. As well as our readers, we’re keen to bring our suppliers along with us and prioritise working with people who have a similar outlook to ourselves, keeping them up to date with our progress.
ESGmark®: To date what has been the biggest challenge to improving HELLO!’s ESG performance and how have you overcome it?
As a heritage publisher, it hasn’t always been easy to minimise our footprint, particularly as our print edition remains as popular as ever, but working smarter and collaborating with other publishers on the logistics side of the business has certainly helped. Legacy infrastructure has also been a challenge, particularly in the office space, however we’re working with our facilities team and our buildings managers to prioritise better practises across the board. We have changed the way that we work, with all of using the office on set days and all working from home on set days. This has meant our office space is utilised well.
ESGmark®: What’s next for HELLO! on your ESG journey?
We’ll continue on our journey and we’ll be looking at how digital media and its footprint can be mitigated. One of the biggest obstacles can be the scale of the task in front of us all – what we relish with ESGmark®, however, is that the pace of our progress is set by us with encouragement from the experts.
We are looking at some of our policies and will be introducing new policies that we hope other ESGmark® accredited companies can benefit from too, such as the introduction of a Domestic Abuse policy.
About ESGmark®:
ESGmark® is the community for people and organisations who care about the planet and society. We support organisations to credibly demonstrate and improve their Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) credentials. The ESGmark® certification is a symbol of trust and distinction which allows consumers to identify organisations who believe in and act to deliver a fairer, more sustainable future.
Through our ESG Spotlight Q&A series, ESGmark® Certified organisations share their approach to responsible business practices and how they create positive impact for the environment, their clients, employees, and communities. Discover more Q&As here.