AIM Group International, which is collaborating with the company already on several projects, helped design and organise their Re-Connect Meeting in Salerno, Southern Italy, involving employees in an engaging CSR project.

To make it a memorable and teambuilding experience, the Community Day was therefore celebrated with a beach clean-up, at a near natural protected oasis, which allowed the Ipsen teams to give back to the community and pursue a common goal. The project proposed by AIM Group, thanks to a creative approach, was able to put in contact different organisations, that until today haven’t collaborated: the Giffoni Film Festival, a famous film festival dedicated to young people which is held annually near Salerno, Legambiente Campania, the local chapter of a national ecologist association and Ipsen, a biopharmaceutical company.

First, Ipsen sponsored in 2022 the first edition of the ‘Giffoni Green Festival’ dedicated to sustainability and a company representative intervened as speaker about their diversity and inclusion programs. Then, we designed a simple, engaging and impactful activity in the area, with a beach clean-up of the protected natural oasis and pine forest in Marina di Eboli. For the first time, Ipsen combined their recurrent internal meetings with a CSR activity, which involved the employees as the real protagonists making at the same time a positive legacy while functioning as an exciting teambuilding opportunity.

The key objectives of the projects were:

• Organise a full in-person meeting where people can experience the value to be face to face again, leveraging the opportunity for discussion and collaboration.
• Motivate employees to share ideas and plans for future projects, re-connecting with all the colleagues after the social distancing and finding new enthusiasm to achieve results.
• Engage employees in a CSR activity able to give back value to local communities and environment, leaving a positive legacy.

Ipsen involved more than 130 employees who headed to the beach to collect rubbish and plastic debris (small items like bottles and wastepaper as well as big ones like tyres, PCs, TVs) that was hidden in the sand and among the trees.

On the beach, the volunteers and experts in environmental welfare from Legambiente, made a speech about how plastics pollute the beaches and the sea and how they affect on the natural environment and wildlife. After a briefing the teams worked together to make the beach as cleaner as possible, sharing a great commitment.

This internal CSR event was promoted among the employees before and during the Re-Connect Meeting – the purpose of the activity was clearly underlined in the program and carefully communicated thanks also to the contribution of ecologist experts from Legambiente. Giffoni was able to make evident the link with the local environment and community and to give the right communication before and after the event – realising also a high-quality, effective video, which was shared also on social media.

Employees were stimulated to share their experiences also on their social media profiles, and they did it, since the commitment and motivation were really high as it usually happens when sharing an important activity with a common goal.

214 kilos of rubbish were collected overall, of which 79kg was plastics, 41Kg end-of-life tyres, 36kg of glass, 28 kg of iron and 11 kg of organic waste.

Ipsen employees were shocked by the large amount of rubbish they found on the beach in a protected natural oasis. One employee for example remarked: “Looking at what we collected I think that by paying more attention and changing our habits, we could really do a lot for our planet and our environment”. So, another positive side of this clean-up is that hundreds of people were given the opportunity to think about ecological matters; in addition to making the beach cleaner, from that day these people will be more aware and sensitive to the fact that small, but non negligible, actions matter and can make the difference to care about our Planet.

Maria Lucia Burriesci, Communication & Patient Advocacy Manager Ipsen, explained: “We chose to support this unique project to pursue a common goal, namely, to have a positive impact on the environment”.

All the tools and products used to collect rubbish (included the vests for volunteers) were made by recycled materials and recycled again after the use. All the rubbish collected was separated and given to a specialised company that will re-use it and put into the recycling process. To give a local flavour and to reduce carbon footprint the coffee break offered to volunteers during the beach clean-up was absolutely km0, prepared by local housewives using their own products (eggs, marmalade, etc.). Water bottles were distributed at the beginning of the re-connect meeting to avoid single-use plastic bottles during all the event.

This project received special recognition at several awards:

• Best Sustainable Event at FCE Awards
• Best B2I Event – Silver Prize at Conventa Awards