Green Retailing

Rejitha C R Minu K J

Introduction
Green retailing can be defined as promoting the use of eco-friendly products, processes, materials or services in order to prevent environmental degradation and create a sustainable environment for people to live.

 Green retailing is the process of developing products and services and promoting them to satisfy the customers who prefer products of good quality, performance and convenience at affordable cost and which do not have a detrimental impact on the environment.

 It includes a broad range of activities like:

modifications in the product, production process, advertising, packaging, etc.,

in order to reduce the detrimental impact of products and their consumption and disposal into the environment.

Green Consumers
Green consumers are customers who buy and consume green products. Understanding the demographics and nature of green consumers becomes extremely important as it can help entrepreneurs explore the environmental market.

 Green consumers are genuine in their intentions and believe in leading greener lifestyles. They always judge their environmental practices as being inadequate and want easy environmental practices that they can follow. Green consumers are generally unaware of the environmental issues.

Why go green ?
More eco conscious and socially responsible. They can reduce their
energy consumption, minimize risks, meet competitive pressure, bolster their brand name and increase their takings.

Why Organizations Should Adopt Green Retailing ?

To gain a competitive advantage Show social responsibility Government pressure Competitive pressure Employee and industry goodwill Consumer friendliness

Competitive advantage
As more and more consumers are becoming aware of the eco-friendly philosophy, green retailers have diverse and fairly sizeable segments to cater to. The Surf Excel detergent, which saves water, (Save two buckets of water daily). Energysaving LG consumer durables and Orpats power saver bulbs are examples of green retailing.

Social responsibility
Many organizations have adopted the green philosophy as a social responsibility. There is a belief among organizations that it can achieve environmental as well as profit-making objectives by adopting green retailing Infosys Technologies prepares all its reports such as financial reports, annual reports and all other related reports using paper made from recycled wastes. HSBC became the worlds first bank to go carbon neutral. Other examples include Coca-Cola, which has recently invested in various recycling activities. Cell phone giants such as Sony Ericsson, Toshiba and Nokia

Government pressure
: The government too has realized the importance of the green philosophy. The government is rising up to the alarming need to make companies more eco-conscious by imposing rules and regulations. The Indian government has developed a framework of legislations to reduce the production of harmful goods and by-products. This reduces the industrys production and consumers consumption of harmful goods, including those products that are damaging to the environment; for example, the ban of plastic bags in Mumbai, prohibition of smoking in public areas, etc.

Competitive pressure
Many organizations comply with green retailing to maintain their competitive edge. The green retailing initiatives launched by niche companies such as Bod Shop and Green & Black have prompted many mainline competitors to follow suit. companies such as Yahoo have started green campaigns. Many other IT companies have started similar campaigns

Employee and industry goodwill

: Most of the employees also feel proud and responsible to be working for an environmentally responsible company. The company would also be able to enjoy goodwill from the retail industry in the long run.

Recycling Improving energy efficiency Collaborating with suppliers Influencing customers to adopt environmental sustainability Reduce packaging

recycling
Envtal sustainable practices can be begun with recycling waste and used products In 2009 best buy began offering free recycling of electronic devices in the US and they resell Further it aquired california based startup deal tree which provides the retailer with software by which it can manage logistics auctions and return processing of used goods

Improving energy efficiency

Retailers can reduce their greenhouse gases emissinsions by improving their energy efficiency. Family mart plans use enegy efficient refrigeration refrigeration equipment to reduce co2 Egs:ebay started campaingns to reduce ghg emissions Shop direct

Collaborating with suplliers

Retailers can also work with suppliers to affect changes in the supply chain that help to reduce the climate impact tesco

Influence customers to adopt envtal sustainability

Retailers can take steps to encourage their customers to act in an envtaly sustainable manner Egs B&Q Tesco:buy 1 get 1 free later

package
Retailers are working to reduce their own packaging requirements. Sainsbury plans to reduce their own packaging wieght by 5,00,000 kg per year by using cartons instead of cans for packaging its basic tinned tomatoes carrefour

Limitations of Green Retailing

Resource crunch. Confusing imagery of products. Questionable credibility.

Challenges to Going Green

Lack of awareness. Less motivation to contribute. High prices. Low availability.

Breaking Down Barriers to Green Retailing

Educate consumers. Build better products. Offer more. Bring products to the people.

Examples

Cub uses packaging made from only 100% renewable resources.

Special parking places reserved for customers driving fuel efficient vehicles.

Messages conveyed include how the store uses reduced refrigerant.

LED refrigerator case lighting to conserve energy.

The overall store operates in a more energy efficient fashion.

Use of natural light to reduce energy consumption

An overall store experience which is designed to be more respectful to nature and healthy for all.

Sainsburys invests in logistics: the trucks use fuel which is generated from the recycled garbage of the stores

McDonalds goes green with Eco Learning Lab in Chicago. This new restaurant is seen as a learning lab, testing all green technologies to adapt to existing and new restaurants.

Ebay

WALMART SUPERCENTER

Goodwill Industries, since its beginning over 100 years ago, has had a singular focus on greentailing, with its business model of reuse. When items is donated to Goodwill stay out of landfills and get repurposed or recycled to help put people back to work.

TESCO

Investment in logistics and recycling: Tesco invests 150.000 euro per store in recycling.

A Tesco "carbon footprint" informational shelf tag (in this case for orange juice) in one of the retailer's United Kingdom supermarkets. Tesco is the only food and grocery retailer in the world using the consumer informational labels at the point-of-purchase.