Corporate Gifts in Your CSRD Report: How to Substantiate Scope 3

The CSRD directive forces large companies in Europe to report their sustainability impact transparently. One of the least sexy but most time-intensive parts is Scope 3, and within that specifically Category 1: Purchased Goods & Services. Corporate gifts, employee gifts and onboarding presents all fall under this category. This article explains how to tackle it without spending days chasing suppliers for data.

We are writing this from MOYU. We are ourselves a supplier of sustainable notebooks and commissioned an independent LCA in 2024 specifically because customers were asking us for Scope 3 data. We share here what we have learned along the way.

First, the basics: why do corporate gifts fall under Scope 3?

The CSRD (Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive) requires companies to report according to the ESRS standards. For climate impact this is ESRS E1, which largely refers to the GHG Protocol for methodology.

The GHG Protocol divides emissions into three scopes:

• Scope 1: direct emissions (own vehicles, own gas heating, etc.)
• Scope 2: indirect emissions from purchased energy (electricity, district heating)
• Scope 3: all other indirect emissions in the value chain (15 categories)

Corporate gifts, Christmas gift packages, onboarding gifts and employee gifts fall under Scope 3, Category 1: Purchased Goods & Services. For most companies Scope 3 is by far the biggest item (often 70 to 90% of the total footprint), so it is not a detail.

The problem: suppliers rarely have data

Anyone who has tried to compile a Scope 3 report knows the pattern. You email a supplier and ask for the CO2 footprint of the product you purchased. Three things can happen:

• They do not answer.
• They answer with a generic marketing claim ("we are climate neutral") without underlying data.
• They send an estimate based on industry averages, not product-specific LCA.

For your auditor or accountant that means: low data quality. The GHG Protocol has a data quality hierarchy where supplier-specific LCA data is at the top, followed by industry averages and spend-based calculations (just the euros you spent times a sector emission factor).

Spend-based works, but is coarse. For a credible report you want supplier-specific data where possible.

What you need for a substantiated report

For each supplier in scope you ideally want the following data:

• Emission factor per product (kg CO2e per unit)
• Method by which this was measured (LCA, sector average, spend-based)
• Whether or not compliant with a standard (ISO 14040/14044, PAS 2050, etc.)
• Whether it is cradle-to-gate or cradle-to-grave
• Number of units purchased in the reporting year

The calculation is then simple: number of units x emission factor = total kg CO2e for that supplier in your Scope 3 Cat. 1 report.

Practical example: MOYU notebooks

To illustrate, here is what a report with our data looks like.

Suppose you bought 500 MOYU notebooks in 2025 as a Christmas gift for your employees.

At this level of granularity an auditor is happy. No estimates, no industry averages, just supplier-specific data with a published methodology.

How to use MOYU data yourself

For our customers we have made it as simple as possible. On moyu-notebooks.com/nl/zakelijk/impact-certificate you can create your own impact certificate based on your order. You enter your order quantity and you get a PDF with:

• Total kg CO2e saved compared to a paper equivalent
• Liters of water saved
• Number of trees not cut
• Energy saved in GJ
• Number of additional trees planted via Trees for Kenya

For the actual figures per unit and the underlying methodology you can download our Supplier Emissions Fact Sheet. This document is made to be directly shareable with your sustainability or audit team.

What to do when suppliers do not provide data

Not every supplier is at MOYU's level of transparency. For suppliers without LCA data you have three options:

Option 1: Industry average

The GHG Protocol publishes sector emission factors. For categories like textiles, office supplies, electronics there are average kg CO2e per euro or per kg product weight. Lower in the data quality hierarchy, but acceptable for auditors if you label it as such.

Option 2: Spend-based

The simplest method: euros spent times a sector emission factor. For example 10,000 euros on corporate gifts times 0.3 kg CO2e per euro (sector average) = 3,000 kg CO2e. Coarse but defensible for a first report.

Option 3: Switch to transparent suppliers

In the longer term this is where things are headed. Sustainability managers at companies with a CSRD obligation increasingly select suppliers based on whether or not they provide substantiated LCA data. Not only because it makes the report easier, but also because reducing Scope 3 starts with being able to measure it.

Practical tips for your report

• Make a supplier list for Scope 3 Cat. 1: top 20 suppliers by spend often cover 80% of the footprint.
• When requesting quotes, ask for the emission factor and LCA method. Suppliers who provide it get preference. Make that explicit in your procurement criteria.
• Document your method per supplier (supplier-specific vs industry-average vs spend-based). Auditors want to know how the figure was calculated.
• Store underlying documentation (fact sheets, LCA reports) digitally in your ESG dossier.
• Start small. A report covering 60% of your Scope 3 with supplier-specific data is better than 100% estimated with spend-based.

In closing

CSRD reporting is not a marketing exercise and not a tick-box list. It is the beginning of a system in which companies substantiate their actual impact with data. For corporate gifts and employee gifts the rule is: the more suppliers are transparent with independent LCA data, the easier your report becomes and the more credible the story towards employees, customers and auditors.

MOYU customers can use our data directly. For the per-order impact certificate: moyu-notebooks.com/nl/zakelijk/impact-certificate. For a quote with our emission factor included: moyu-notebooks.com/nl/zakelijk.