Retail Brands need to play big roles in driving sustainability — and this is the time to start making substantial progress.

Speakers in Day One of the Velocity Institute (RBI) Sustainability Summit relayed the importance of enhancing efforts in areas including packaging, recycling and waste reduction. They said retailers embracing sustainability will be viewed by shoppers as environmental stewards.

Major Benefits for Retail Brands

“There are important benefits for own brands,” said Robert Zuehlke, Manager of Corporate Social Responsibility, Wakefern Food Corp. “It enables us to connect with customers who are now demanding more sustainability efforts. It also helps us collaborate with suppliers well beyond transactional relationships, and bring them along on our sustainability journey.

He added, “We can all understand the why of sustainability, but the how is incredibly challenging. It is really about implementation.”

Design Plays Important Role

Succeeding with sustainability requires involvement from stakeholders across retail organizations, including those on the branding, packaging and design sides, speakers said.

“Design used to come at the end of the process,” said Tatiana Ryfer, Head of Branding & Visual Identity at Carrefour. “Today, being involved in the earlier phases allows us to have a greater impact.”

She emphasized that  “sustainability isn’t just a subject anymore, it’s the way you need to think. It’s part of the global conscience of customers impacted by COVID, who are becoming more aware.”

Opportunity for Industry Leadership

The Retail Brands sector has a special role to play in making sustainability a reality, said Christopher Durham, President of RBI.

“This is an opportunity for Retail Brands to lead,” he said. “There are so many areas for improvement, from product to packaging. There’s a need for retailers, manufacturers, solution partners and software partners to band together to do this better.”

Durham announced the launch of an RBI Sustainability Working Group to help drive progress across the Retail Brands sector. He urged interested retailers, manufacturers and others to reach out to express interest in joining the effort.

“We need to raise the industry’s sustainability baseline,” he said. “We’re at a low level. The goal is progress, not perfection. This will be a bold process of banding together as an industry. After that, retailer and manufacturers that want to differentiate beyond the baseline can still do it.”

There’s more to come tomorrow in Day Two of the RBI Sustainability Summit, including exciting presentations from executives at Walmart, Tesco, CVS Health and Giant Eagle.