CASE STUDY
There’s No Plan B. By Severnside
Marks & Spencer is leading the way on retail sustainability. It was one of the first retailers to recognise that the sector needed to make a significant step change in its approach in order to minimise the environmental impact of its operations. For its own part, in 2007 the retailer launched Plan A, a list of ethical and environmental commitments involving all areas of its business. Now three years on, M&S is well on its way to achieving its 2012 goals and has recently extended its commitments, aiming to become the world’s most sustainable retailer by 2015.
Reducing waste is a key part of Plan A. With 711 stores across the UK and Republic of Ireland and over 65,000 employees, M&S wanted to significantly reduce the amount of waste it sends to landfill. From packaging and plastics, through to cardboard and food, the retailer wanted to find more sustainable solutions for its waste.
In April 2009, M&S’ operations in the UK and Republic of Ireland recycled 41% of its waste. It has since set annual targets which increase incrementally - 75% by 2010, 90% by 2011 and 100% by 2012. To reach the 100% target, M&S needed to transform its waste management processes; its first step was to appoint a waste management partner that focused on sustainable solutions rather than landfill. Cardiff-based Severnside Recycling was chosen; a company with a long tradition of working in the retail sector, which most importantly does not operate any landfill sites. Indeed, it uses landfill only as a last resort where there is no viable sustainable option.
To kick off their relationship, Severnside undertook a waste and recycling audit of M&S’ operations to understand what, where and how waste was being generated and disposed of. “This activity was critical for us to devise a strategy that would provide sustainable solutions and one that would be practical to implement at a day-to-day store level,” said Tim Price, National Commercial Manager for Severnside. “In fact, it was imperative to provide solutions that would not mean additional processes and time. With the detail from the waste audit we could understand which key materials to look at initially that would have the greatest impact.”
One of the most important areas for primary focus was organic waste. After cardboard, organic waste was the largest contributor to M&S’ total waste. As out of date food is required to be disposed of, traditionally through landfill or by expensive treatment processes, an effective solution was required. Price added: “It was important to find a process that would allow organic waste to be separated from all other types of materials – enabling us to better capture cleaner dry material for recycling. |138| ENVIRONMENT INDUSTRY MAGAZINE
Severnside, with its packaging parent company DS Smith and supported by Helistrat Management Services, rolled out a corrugated receptacle that could be used and would enable organic waste to be disposed of straight from the shelf.”
Mandy Keepax, Head of Facilities and Waste at M&S, explained more: “This box has enabled us to not only separate organic waste but also significantly reduce our in-store processes. Our operations team were soon converts as it made the process much simpler, cleaner and more efficient, reducing the time and effort to dispose of waste. From a management perspective, this is paramount - reducing rather than increasing time spent and enabling staff to concentrate on other important store activities such as customer service.”
Bin capacity on M&S sites has been significantly reduced when compared to the pre-audit service to help reduce the overall waste budget. The new waste management process makes use of M&S’ existing logistics operation and takes the waste to the regional distribution centres. “Using our existing logistics network embodies the essence of our Plan A commitments and is helping to reduce our carbon emissions by eliminating the need for store level waste collections, as well as reducing empty running of vehicles,” said Keepax.
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