Carton Plein

Founded in 2012, Carton Plein is a French association focused on professional and social inclusion. Their mission is to provide employment to people distant from the labour market or in precarious and vulnerable situations. Through work, people gradually reconnect with employment and gain access to their most fundamental rights: social relationships, income, health, housing, etc.

© Fondation Caritas

The social enterprise achieves this impact through two activities: cardboard reuse and cycle logistics. It initially began with cardboard reconditioning. Carton Plein collects cardboard from merchants and retailers in Paris and nearby cities, using bike trailers. Once collected, the cardboard is transported to the reuse workshop, where it is sorted, cleaned of tape and labels, and categorised by size. It is then resold as second-hand boxes for moving or shipping goods. The cardboard that is not in good condition is transformed into new products: either in protection materials (substitutes for bubble wrap and polystyrene chips); or in animal bedding and dry material for compost.

© Fondation Caritas

In addition to reducing cardboard waste, Carton Plein diversified into other cycle logistics services in recent years. They now collect other waste materials (biowaste, plastics, paper, cigarettes etc.) using bike trailers, and subcontract with other waste management companies. As part of their cycle logistics activities, the enterprise also offers bike last-mile delivery services and moving services.

The enterprise operates in four locations in the region of Île-de-France:

• Paris 11th arrondissement: Cycle logistics hub
• Paris 18th arrondissement: Workshop/store for cardboard reuse
• Nanterre: Cycle logistics and Workshop/store for cardboard reuse
• Pantin: Cycle logistics and Workshop/store for cardboard reuse

Social Procurement Partnerships

For its primary activity, the cardboard collect by bike, Carton Plein has established lasting relationships with partners who face waste management needs and are seeking ecological and solidarity-based solutions.

Most of their clients are retail companies such as Eram, Faguo, Diptyque, or Aesop. “We're delighted to be working with Carton Plein, who, thanks to the quality of their service and the dedication of their entire team, enable us to give a second life to our cardboard boxes”, shares the Eram team.

They also serve institutional and governmental organisations like APHP (Assistance Publique des Hôpitaux de Paris), Paris Habitat, and the territorial public establishment “Est Ensemble”, which offered them a public contract for collecting cardboard from local businesses.

In addition to its core activity, Carton Plein offers bike collection services to waste companies, managing first-mile logistics in dense urban areas. Small to medium waste flows are distributed over a specific geographical scope (where the use of trucks is very complicated). These are collected using bike trailers and then consolidated in one location before being removed all at once by a truck. The enterprise thus helps reduce traffic related to urban transport while providing a very efficient and sustainable transport service through bicycles. Carton Plein for example serves the waste management company "Les Alchimistes": every month, this partnership represents 15 tons of biowaste collected from 500 points, which provides employment to approximately 3 full-time equivalent (FTE) employees.

Finally, the social enterprise also offers bike delivery services for various types of goods (documents, packages, food items, beverages, etc.), providing an alternative (sustainable) solution to the truck delivery in a city centre, which suffers from high traffic and alarming pollution due to those transportations and delivery activities.

“Historically focused on a B2C clientele, we have gradually shifted towards B2B partnerships as we grew, initially in cycle logistics, then in the supply of reusable boxes. This helps us structure our business model, as working with private sector companies allows us to access larger and, more importantly, more consistent markets. These regular workflows that we are able to establish facilitate the process of professional integration, as they provide reassurance and help restore self-confidence for our colleagues.

From our clients' perspective, they appreciate working with an organisation like ours, which aligns with the social, environmental, and societal aspects of their CSR strategy. The commercial relationship often grows over time, evolving into a 360-degree collaboration that also addresses HR needs, with employment bridges between our structures: a solution to recruitment challenges for our clients, and greater social impact for Carton Plein."

- Odile Rosset, Director at Carton Plein

Impact

Carton Plein activities respond to the organisation’s three key principles: 

• Be respectful of the environment: through the reduction of waste and the use of bicycle transport
• Be solidar: through the training and employment of people in vulnerable situations and who are excluded from society
• Be rooted in a territory: empower the local community within the region of Ile-de-France

The social enterprise supports people in various precarious situations: including refugees,

 individuals with past addictions, and others distanced from the labour market for various reasons. For example, in one of the locations, 60% of employees have been homeless for one to five years. Carton Plein trains and retains employees on average for one to two years, while helping them in finding another job afterwards. This way, they can help professionally insert new joiners on a rolling basis.

To date: 

• 40 full-time equivalent employees, represented by 90 re-integrated employees
• More than 214 tons of cardboard collected in 2023
• 15 tons of biowaste collected per month
• 140,500 km travelled by bike in 2023
• 98 tons of CO2 equivalent saved through biking in 2023 (compared to a light commercial vehicle)