“As a business, we’re trying to be as sustainable and as energy efficient as we possibly can, across the board for our clients.”
Joe Dunningham | Accent Services
It started with a question from a client.
Accent Services, a national air conditioning and mechanical services company, had never set out to become a sustainability leader. But when its biggest client asked it to start measuring carbon emissions, the business spotted something bigger than a compliance exercise. It saw a way to grow.
Today, Accent has signed up to Platinum with NCZ, sits at the highest partner level in the Daikin Decarbonised Partner Programme, and answers sustainability questions on client questionnaires with the kind of confidence most SMEs can only wish for. This is the story of how it got there, and why the smartest move was not doing more, but doing it smarter.
The business behind the story
Accent Services runs on two strong engines. Service and maintenance delivers roughly half of turnover, providing national coverage from the company’s offices in Shepperton. The project side handles design and installation of full HVAC and mechanical services, going well beyond air conditioning and chillers.
Around 80% of the business currently flows through FM companies on the service side, with the project team working closely with fit-out companies. And the business is not standing still. Accent is actively building its direct end-user client base, creating new opportunities and greater control over its own future.
The moment everything changed
Every transformation has a trigger. For Accent, it came from its biggest client, a leading FM company with a strong focus on sustainable supply chains.
The client encouraged Accent to begin measuring its CO2 emissions, first through Avani, then Emitwise, and later through an invitation to join an EcoVadis pilot. Each step pulled Accent deeper into a world it had never explored: understanding its emissions, questioning its practices, and asking how it could operate in a more eco-friendly way.
Accent had already made early moves, such as switching its offices to energy-efficient LED lighting. But those were internal energy savings. What changed was the mindset. When your biggest client tells you that measuring your emissions helps them meet their targets, and that this ultimately leads to more work, sustainability stops being a cost line. It becomes a growth strategy.
The market confirmed it. Sustainability questions were appearing on more and more pre-qualification questionnaires and tenders. And right at the moment Accent found itself facing questions it could not yet answer, NCZ reached out. The timing could not have been better.
One partner instead of many
Here is where Accent made its shrewdest decision.
With different clients requesting different accreditations, each carrying its own cost, the temptation was to sign up to everything. Accent chose a different path. It noticed that the question clients actually ask, again and again, is whether CO2 emissions are being measured by a third party provider delivering ISO compliant reporting.
So instead of spreading budget across multiple schemes, Accent consolidated everything into a single, credible partnership with NCZ. One partner. One clear answer to the question every client asks. A streamlined investment that delivers exactly what procurement teams are looking for.
Support that actually feels like support
For an SME without an in-house sustainability team, the difference between a platform and a partner is everything.
Accent found the NCZ portal straightforward from day one. Where the process could have become confusing, it did not, because there was always someone on hand. Philippa at NCZ worked with Accent to match its nominal spend codes to the portal’s categories, making sure every figure landed exactly where it should. After each submission, a follow-up meeting walks through the report, the results, and the next steps, so the business always knows where it stands and where it is heading.
The result: a process Accent describes as smooth from start to finish, and the confident hand-holding a growing business genuinely needs.
First through the door: the Daikin Decarbonised Partner Programme
Sometimes preparation meets opportunity at exactly the right moment.
When Steve Malloy, heading up Daikin’s new Decarbonised Partner Programme, reached out to introduce the initiative, Accent had just partnered with NCZ. Daikin’s response was immediate: this was exactly the type of business it wanted to work with. Would Accent like to be one of the very first partners?
The application was refreshingly simple. Membership of the Supply Chain Sustainability School at bronze level or above, plus a partnership with an ISO-accredited sustainability partner such as NCZ. Accent already ticked both boxes.
Then comes the part most businesses do not know exists: the funding. Daikin operates a D1 marketing support fund linked to annual spend, and Accent holds D1 Plus status, the highest level available. That allows the business to contribute 75% towards the cost of marketing activities from its D1 fund, with Daikin believed to support up to 100% of any additional costs required to meet the decarbonised partner criteria.
And the real prize is still ahead. Daikin is encouraging its consultants to specify decarbonised partners on projects, meaning future specifications may call for a decarbonised partner as standard. Momentum is building fastest in end-user sectors such as hotels and street retail, and as one of the first businesses in the programme, Accent is standing exactly where the market is heading.
What it means for the bottom line
Ask any contractor what wins work today, and sustainability credentials are climbing the list fast.
Sustainability questions now appear regularly in client onboarding and pre-qualification processes, and Accent answers them confidently and comprehensively. That capability clears the first hurdle and gets the business onto the books of major clients, exactly where it needs to be as sustainability rises up the procurement agenda.
The direction of travel is unmistakable. Requirements cascade down from the top of the supply chain. When an end client asks for an NCZ Platinum partner, that requirement filters through the FM companies to their contractors. Accent’s own journey began exactly this way. By acting early, the business is ready for whatever clients ask for next, while competitors are still working out where to start.
The next chapter
The story is far from finished.
Accent has locked in its carbon baseline for 2024 and is already compiling its 2025 figures. Signing up to Platinum with NCZ marks the start of the next phase: capturing Scope 3 emissions data from across the supply chain. The discovery that around 80% of its emissions sit in Scope 3 was a genuine eye-opener, and gathering that data will give Accent a complete picture of its footprint and a powerful foundation for future reductions.
The ambition behind it all is refreshingly simple. To be as sustainable and as energy efficient as the business possibly can, across the board and for every client.
One client question started the journey. Smart partnerships turned it into an advantage. And for Accent Services, the best part is what comes next.