Sustainable Mail? — A Q&A With Mal Warwick

EB: When did you begin to understand the concept of the “triple bottom line”?

MW: Not until I joined an organization called Social Ventures Network in 1990. That was an early pioneer in the field and in many ways responsible for putting the concept of social responsibility on the agenda of corporations around the world. I learned over a period of a few years from my fellow members how much benefit they were getting, both on a personal level and a corporate level, from operating their businesses in a way that respected the needs and aspirations of all their stakeholders, not just their owners — so the employees, members of the community where they did business, the suppliers with whom they partnered and who didn’t just buy the lowest price, and the environmental concerns.