FOOD & DRINK
UNPACKING THE CASE FOR PLASTIC-FREE
Premium frozen food specialists, field fare, were eco-trailblazers 40 years ago. Today, they
continue the quest for zero-waste by actively pushing their stockists to offer ‘Bring Your Own Container’ options on their loose serve lines. MD, Karen Deans, tells Tomorrow’s FM why.
We’ve all hung our heads in shame at images of fish battling through murky seams of suspended plastic. We’ve listened in horror to Sir David’s armageddon warnings and recoiled at the accompanying statistics.
An estimated 2.7m tons of plastic shipped to China from the UK since 2012. Two thirds of packaging still unrecyclable. 13bn plastic bottles thrown away per year in the UK. The depressing figures just keep coming and growing.
Without doubt, plastic is the new public enemy and with the government’s 25-year environment plan aiming to eliminate avoidable plastic waste by 2042, future proofing any business will require improving sustainability, being seen to do so and offering customers ways to do the same. The so-called ‘Attenborough effect’ has created a new, informed consumer-with-a-conscience, who is actively looking for ways to ‘do their bit’.
This is great news for the retailer, however, opening up a wealth of potential opportunities for positive PR, for promoting progressive brand values, communicating integrity and encouraging consumer loyalty. It is a route to expanding customer bases to particularly target the holy grail, millennial “green generation” and for viscerally
42 | TOMORROW’S FM
connecting with customers on a common cause… all whilst helping to save the planet.
Sustainability has been a central field fare concern for over 40 years, and in 2018 we began a proactive push to encourage stockists of our loose frozen lines to enable their customers to bring reusable containers to fill with our fruit, veg, fish and baked goods. We were already offering branded, biodegradable bags, but the scoop-and- serve business model that we’d introduced back in 1987 was ready made for taking the next step towards zero waste, buoyed by a 5,000-strong Iceland survey revealing that 80% of shoppers would welcome a plastic-free shop.
Uptake was initially hesitant, but is now growing exponentially and the fringe benefits for our stockists have been surprising and wonderful. As a unique offer, many report that it has created a destination point out of their shops. It has given them a reason to talk meaningfully to their customers, whether through social media and shop signage, through discounting offers for those bringing their own containers or through their local press. As most of our 400 stockists are independent garden centres and farm shops, it has underlined their connection with the environment, with farming and the local community
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