Impact24 - POPAI's third Sustainability Summit

For POPAI’s third Sustainability Summit, Impact24 the room was alive with insights and debate related to sustainability within retail. The presentations and discussions made it a great event for all who attended, both the face-to-face event in London and those around the world on the live-stream.

Martin Kingdon , POPAI’s Sustainability Director kicked off the day by giving an update on POPAI’s sustainability activities over the last year and thanked a number of pioneer companies who are committed to reducing the display industry’s impact on the environment.

The first presentation of the day was about the British Retail Consortium 's (BRC) industry roadmap for net zero retail. Tracey Banks , Climate Action Programme Manager shared their roadmap ambition, their targets, five pathways and milestones. The presentation covered how Scope 3 is likely to account for more than 90% of emissions and showcased a number of retailer achievements from their Roadmap Showcase Awards. Finally, the presentation closed by challenging everyone in the room to consider what their ‘sustainability role’ is, within their jobs but also as shoppers and consumers.

Vanessa Heard , Merchandising Solutions Executive from JTI , the global tobacco and vaping company, was next to share their sustainability journey. The JTI UK merchandising team has adopted a number of KPIs relating to their merchandising units and have a strategy to recycle, repair and reuse components and have a zero-landfill target by 2025. The team have managed to achieve significant financial savings by repairing and reusing display elements and have created new sustainability supplier targets around the use of recycled materials and recyclability at the end of life. Tracy Scutt, Managing Director of Arken POP finished the presentation by sharing a case study of a display they had designed for the Ploom brand. The result was a lightweight, modular display that could be updated for future campaigns. The design was created using Arken’s Design Matrix and three different options were compared using the POPAI Sustain? tool to assess their carbon footprint, percentage of recycled material and circularity.

Following a tea and coffee break the event continued with the first of our Snapshot companies presenting on their products and services under the pressure of the 5-minute deadline. First up was Aimee Grandfield from arken P-O-P International who discussed their recent B Corp certification. Next was Simon Philpott from 3A Composites who gave an update on their materials, the environmental rating of their factories and the LCA calculations for all their brands, this was followed by Michael Archer from CHEP who updated us on their work to pioneer the circular economy and the Refill Coalition. Finally, Damian Sorgiovanni from The Delta Group? gave an update on Delta Group’s Net Zero model, a new production unit, and their reporting capabilities.

We continued the theme of materials with the next presentation where Steve Lister, Head of Global Sustainability for POPAI presented on a paradigm shift in retail display materials. He covered trends in materials with the move away from PVC and single use plastics, the increase in recycled content and fibre-based products, and the increased focus on certified materials. He discussed the materials ‘tri-lemma’ faced between cost, sustainability credentials and specification/functionality and challenged the myth that sustainable materials are typically more expensive. His recent research on a number of materials actually showed that alternative more sustainable materials are actually a very similar price, or actually slightly lower. He finished his presentation by showcasing a number of materials and products that have recently caught his eye.

The last presentation before the lunch break was by mark horner , Head of Vertas Environmental about how waste legislation is changing and the impact this will have. We are expected to see more UK targets for carbon reduction, increased recycling targets, the need for cultural and behavioural change in the UK, a reduction in the amount of packaging used and the re-introduction of deposit return schemes. Mark covered the highlights and the impact on the display industry in relation to the Packaging Waste Directive, recycling targets, the Green Claims Directive, and the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD).

Following a lively lunch and networking break we kicked off again with Lorene BERRODIER , Retail Design Director for 欧莱雅 UK & Ireland giving an update on their sustainability journey towards more circular POS. The past couple of years has been focused on defining eco design, launching a cross-divisional task force, developing a circular POS framework, using Sustain? to track KPIs, and engaging people internally. The next part of the journey will be focused on the route to net zero and look at reducing POS waste, improving the recyclability rate of displays and creating circular projects. Lorene’s key takeaways were to look at circular economy solutions, don’t just go for the obvious solution, focus your efforts on what matters, that it’s all about the people and that it’s an ongoing journey.

The second set of quick-fire Snapshot presentations was led by Anouska Kett from DS Smith who spoke about how they believe waste is a design flaw and covered their five circular design principles for more sustainable POS. The team from HP covered their vision to be the world’s most sustainable and just technology company and gave examples of how they are doing it. Neil McCarthy from Pyramid Display Materials Limited was next and covered how to decode environmentally friendly POS by looking at LCA ratings, certifications and standards and showcased a number of materials. Finally, Stephen Hall from TeamHaven presented on how brands and retailers can use their software platform for field management, data capture and reporting to prolong display lifecyles, efficiently manage maintenance issues, and how to close the disposal loop by evidencing recycling at the end of life.

Designing for Sustainability was the theme of this year’s panel session led by Steve Lister and included John Magill , Head of European Store Design for Sky , Richard Fisher , Design Manager for Holland & Barrett , and Aimee Grandfield, Head of Insights & Marketing for Arken POP. They discussed their overall strategies for designing sustainably through the use of design guidelines, benchmarking materials and understanding the impact of different decisions. John explained how they translated overarching strategy to be relevant to retail and Richard said that design can be used to answer a problem creatively. All panellists agreed that collaboration is key and that it is important to have the right partners on board and senior support within the business for successful design projects.

Moving on to the final section of the day, Andy Lockett , Commercial Innovation Lead for Veolia presented on a sustainable approach to resource optimisation looking at the recycling infrastructure in the UK and upcoming legislation. Luther Hinga , Recyclability Consultant for CircPack followed by giving examples of projects for McDonalds and Pringles where the use of single-use plastics have been reviewed and packaging re-designed for more effective recycling. The presentation ended with the importance of acting with urgency due to the ecological and legislative pressures we face, to think about the supply chain as a circular opportunity and to reflect and review design guidelines for products to ensure they support recycling and circularity.

The final presentation of the day was given by Ligia Rolim , Head of Trade Marketing Europe and Madeleine Knowles , Customer Sustainability Global Lead for 罗技 looking at their sustainability journey. The presentation covered Logitech’s approach of ‘designing a positive future’ that covers climate action, circularity and social impact. Two in three of Logitech’s products are made with recycled plastic and they are the first consumer electronics company to commit to providing detailed carbon impact labelling on packaging helping people to make informed choices. Lígia shared how their POSM production is based on sustainable principles with eco-guidelines, carbon print tracking. They are currently reviewing and making design revisions to reduce the number of materials used in displays, to reduce packaging and reduce the impact of electrical components needed in displays.

Martin rounded off the day by summarising a number of key points raised. Firstly, that regulation and legislation in the UK and Europe will be shaping and impacting on the display industry in the coming months and years - from greenwashing to measurement and reporting the bar is going to be raised. The importance of designing with sustainability in mind was clear in many of the sessions during the day as was the need for collaboration and partnerships across the industry from brands, retailers and the whole supply chain.

Please do share your thoughts from the day below and we look forward to seeing you at our next event!