Paperstone – Office life, work and fun

Office Greenery Good For Business

By Paperstone on June 26, 2009 in Office Workers

If you’re thinking of cutting down on office plants as a way to cut costs in the current recession, think again. Not only do plants brighten up work environments and help keep the air clean; they also have positive psychological effects that translate into real business benefits.

According to recent research conducted by academics at the Agricultural University of Norway, office plants can help reduce sickies by a whopping 60 percent. Environmental Psychologist Tina Brinslimark studied 305 workers in three different offices in Norway. She explains, “We investigated the amount of self-reported sick leave and compared it with the amount of plants they could see from their desk. The more plants they could see, then the less self-reported sick leave there was.”

Interior landscape specialists Urban Planters collated and compared this data with hours and earnings statistics for UK workers. With the average office worker earning around £25,000 and taking between 6.5 and 11.5 sick days a year, a 60 percent reduction equates to an annual saving to business of between £622.70 and £1,101.70 per worker.

While the plants clean the air, microbes in the soil remove organisms that cause headaches, coughs and dry skin.

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