The UK film industry contributes £4.5 billion to the Economy. It’s also responsible for an estimated 500,000 tonnes of carbon a year. Producers, cameramen and gaffers (film electricians) would like to be green, but a lack of affordable alternatives to power-hungry incandescent film lights make this difficult.
We set up Green Kit to address this problem by bringing some of the fantastic green innovation from other industries into Film. When we started the business in 2010; BAFTA, Film London and others were developing a management standard for sustainable film, which has just been published. There was a groundswell of interest in the potential of Green Business to deliver economic solutions. Unfortunately interest didn’t equal investment and film lighting was considered too niche a market to qualify for funding from bodies like the Carbon Trust who were focused on larger companies.
We were encouraged by winning a place on the Mayday/Rothschild mentoring scheme. It validated our belief that energy efficient film lighting was an idea worth pursuing. We had struggled to get the attention of companies whose technologies we recognised could make a real difference in our market.
We’ve had one really in-depth meeting with our mentor with another scheduled for next month. Roger doesn’t have a film background, which is really helpful since he challenges us to present our ideas in terms that investors and potential partners outside the industry can relate to. He helps us focus on the potential of our products to be useful in new markets and other lighting sectors and to plan for the future rather than get too embroiled in detail of running a small business.
These are tough times for small business, particularly for green business as some sceptics worry that the Environment is a distraction from the economic crises that surround us. At Green Kit we believe that resource efficiency, waste reduction and acting on feedback from our market come easier to a start-up than to a corporate with a huge infrastructure. With the contacts we are making through the mentoring scheme we hope that when the light turns green we will be ready for the road ahead!
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The Prince’s Mayday Network is convened by Business in the Community
