The Griesser Company Challenge: climate care ideas from our apprentice corps.

Time and again our apprentices have actively contributed their ideas for reducing our corporate carbon footprint through their participation in our Griesser Company Challenge. One example: reducing the use of disposable cups at our Aadorf head office. A project was conducted to analyze the current situation and identify alternatives. The result: water dispensers were installed sitewide and the disposable cups were eliminated. The savings: some 108,000 disposable cups a year.

The winning project for 2022: Green, Greener, Griesser
More greenery and more areas for bees and other insects instead of the existing gray: that was the aim of the winning project in the 2022 Griesser Company Challenge. The apprentices involved set out to ‘green’ our Aadorf site and enhance its local biodiversity. The team laid down the foundations for making their goal happen, approached a local gardening center for the requisite specialist advice, conducted their own site analysis and determined what needed to be planted where. And in the follow-up employee survey, they earned a strongly positive response from the site’s personnel. For the 2024 Griesser Company Challenge, the judging panel felt that all the projects proposed could help Griesser achieve its sustainability objectives, and that all the ideas presented have the potential to make a tangible contribution to the climate protection goal.

The winning project for 2024: The Mobility Concept

From idea to judging
So how does the Griesser Company Challenge work? The company’s apprentices work in project teams on their own ideas to protect the climate and enhance energy efficiency. For many of them, this will be their first project work in a corporate environment and their first activities beyond their own particular field. The apprentice teams are also supported in these activities by representatives from myclimate, by their coaches and instructors and by the Griesser Sustainability Team.

Step by step
The teams have five working days to flesh out their ideas and get to grips with the concrete challenges they entail. The process helps develop both their methodological skills and their technical expertise, and also helps them expand their personal networks within the Griesser organization. At the end of the process, the teams present their projects to a judging panel drawn from Griesser’s top management, their coaches and instructors and myclimate representatives.