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BOA Community Initiatives and our response to covid-19.

April 2020

Dear BOA community,                                                                         

First, I would like to wish you and your family good health, safety, and financial well-being during these challenging and unprecedented times.

As you know, during this difficult period it is critical for people to come together to support and care for each other, even in the face of physical distancing. It is also important to ensure that we do not lose sight of our future vision while concurrently addressing what is directly in front of us; a delicate and important balance.

That said, I thought it would be important to provide an update on what BOA is doing and how we are operating during the COVID-19 crisis as well as provide an update on our ongoing community and sustainability initiatives. Due to the acute focus on short-term challenges, the emphasis will be, of course, on the near-term.

Our facilities in China, Korea, Japan, USA, and Austria, are each at different stages based upon the impact of the virus. The Korea, China and Japan teams are all operational and continue to predominately work remotely. Our teams in these markets are expected to formally return to work in their respective offices in the next few weeks.

Our European and North America facilities, which are based in Austria and Denver, have transitioned to predominately remote operations. Our Consumer Support /Warranty team will not be disrupted, and we are partnering with key supplier partners and our China team to continue to move new product development and quality initiatives forward.

Regarding the communities we serve and live in, like you, we are doing everything possible to continue to support them and am very proud of our team for proactively supporting many organizations including: Colorado Village Collaborative, The Garden Place Academy, Denver Metro Emergency Food Delivery Network (DMEFN), Big Brothers Big Sisters of Colorado, Chill, Denver Mission, Lo Wong Man Nursing Home, and others through volunteering, providing meals, and financial support. It is never enough, but every caring action is important and meaningful.

Regarding our long-term initiatives, I would like to briefly touch on our progress this past year regarding specifically Sustainability. Although the primary focus around the world at this moment in time is addressing/mitigating the impact of the virus on humans, we must not lose sight of the existential challenge ahead of us to protect our planet.

Last year we set a number of sustainability goals including; a dramatic reduction in the use of virgin plastics (50% by 2027 as a % of volume), transitioning to 100% sustainable packaging, achieving 100% of our finished products with recycled/renewable materials (100% of products with minimally 25% recycled/renewable by 2027), and dramatically improving our energy efficiency and waste reduction within our facilities. 

Due to the excellent efforts of our team and partners, we made material progress in 2019 achieving our short-term milestones including: reduced our virgin plastic usage by 12%, achieved 20% of our products with renewable/recycled materials, and we are on pace to achieve 60% sustainable packaging by end of 2020, while significantly reducing our total packaging material usage. 

Additionally, we have and will continue to support organizations committed to supporting our planet including; Protect Our Winters (POW), Colorado 14ers Initiative, and Scraps. We are still early in our journey and inspired by the sustainability efforts of our Consumers, Brand Partners, Suppliers, and Non-Profit Organizations who are also committed to making a big impact with a small footprint.

We are reminded more than ever that life is precious, and our beautiful planet is delicate. This requires that all of us come together to ensure we support our families, friends, colleagues, community, and the environment through both the short-term challenges and long-term opportunities to leave things better than we found them.

In closing, thank you very much for your continued support.

Please stay safe and healthy,

Shawn Neville
CEO BOA Technology