Giving back
Pay a visit to Morpho Travel Experience stores across Latin America, and the company’s strong ethos of giving back to people and planet quickly becomes clear.
Morpho has signed up to play its part in delivering the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Its own sustainability strategy is based around three key pillars: For the People (see next page), For the World and For the Oceans. This is embedded in all aspects of the organisation and represents a guide to how it operates, fuelling its sustainability-led innovation drive.
This also chimes with many of the values that have seen Costa Rica become one of the most sustainable places on earth. In the past 75 years, Costa Rica has been able to abolish the military, strengthen human rights, increase economic prosperity while expanding forest coverage and providing renewable, clean energy into the national system.
For the Oceans
Morpho has a particular focus on investing a share of revenues from certain items to preserving the world’s oceans – a theme that one sees played out across the Costa Rican tourism market with its marketing of sustainable tourism solutions.
A recent new character to its plush favourites on-shelf is Shelly, a turtle made from plastic bottles that have been taken from the oceans.
The turtle itself is a neat fit for the company – it is a well-known symbol of Costa Rica. The leatherback sea turtle (Tortuga Baula) and the green sea turtle (Carey) among others, arrive by the thousands to nest at specific beaches in the Pacific and Caribbean coasts. This synchronised movement is known in Spanish as the arribada. It also gave Morpho parent Grupo Arribada the inspiration for its name in this year’s rebranding.
For every one of the Shelly ‘ambassadors’ sold, the company gives a proportion to a campaign to protect the oceans through NGO The Ocean Clean Up. Not only that, but it promotes that story via QR codes and video in the stores, explaining the work of the organisation and how customers can lend their support to recycling drives and ocean cleaning initiatives too.
There is much more besides. The company stopped delivering plastic bags from 2018, amounting to 4.1 million when considering the sales made up to 2022. The Bring it Back initiative seeks to recover plastic bottles in its shops, send them to recycling chains while Morpho rewards customers and avoids plastic from reaching the oceans.
For the World
The company has focused heavily on supporting a circular economy across Morpho supply chains and in stepping up its investment in green innovation through its in-store experiences and back-of-house operations.
Key initiatives include ensuring that ambassadors have access to filtered water stations, that bottled water comes from reputable sources, or that waste water is correctly processed. A push for biodiversity and clean energy at HQ and across its operations is also a central feature – at its head offices, a solar farm with 474 panels covers 80% of energy consumption.
Each project is built on sustainable practices, from design to execution, as part of a push for green infrastructure across the business. A Corporate Recycling programme allows Morpho teams to recycle an estimated 300 tons of recoverable materials per year, diverting them from landfills.
Sustainable packaging, and sourcing materials and food sustainably are part of this drive too. Purchasing policy takes into consideration environmental impact. Morpho aims to work with small and medium-sized suppliers that are interested in preserving land ecosystems. Examples include upcycled-eyewear, souvenirs certified with well-managed forests sources or textiles sourced from responsible animal welfare operations, such as Vicuña Conservation and Management.
*See next page for more on Morpho’s ‘For the People’ values.
August 2023