Behind the scenes of the first award for retail initiatives that mainstream sustainable food

On 23 January 2020, Rikolto in Belgium awarded the ‘I’m more than my receipt’-Award to Colruyt, a major retailer in Belgium. The award wants to highlight and reward credible sustainability initiatives of Belgian retailers that make sustainable food the new normal for every consumer. In this article we showcase the results and process behind this award.

What is a “credible” sustainability initiative? How do we distinguish greenwashing from structural efforts with a long-term vision that generate true impact? And how do we define 'impact'?

We consulted a diverse panel, consisting of experts in life cycle analyses, retail, health, farming, marketing, economics and value chain development. Most of these experts also agreed to take a seat in our jury (step 3). The panel defined the following criteria:

1. Long-term impact: Is there a commitment in time? Is a growth trajectory in place? Does the initiative have a wide reach?
2. Impact on the 3 dimensions of sustainability: Economical (improving producers income, improving price stability and transparency,…); Social (improving consumer health, working conditions, animal wellbeing, inclusion of vulnerable groups,…); Ecological (reducing GHG emissions, ecological footprint, water footprint, land usage, improving biodiversity);
3. User friendliness: does the initiative make it easier for the consumer to buy sustainably? In other words: it should not require more time, mental effort or money from the consumer’s side.
4. Integration in company practices: Does the initiative involve multiple departments (procurement, marketing, shopkeepers, …) ?
5. Involvement of other chain actors (suppliers, customers, …): Are suppliers involved in determining new standards and practices? How are customers involved (e.g. test panels, communication campaigns, shareholdership,…)?
6. Leadership: Is the company showing leadership with the initiative, for example by taking a stand on a certain issue and showing the way for the whole sector? Is the company taking a risk in doing so? How innovative is the initiative compared to initiatives of the company’s peers?

With our concept & criteria document in place, we contacted the five national retailers in Belgium at the beginning of September 2019: Colruyt Group, Delhaize, Carrefour, Aldi and Lidl. We agreed that each retail group could file 3 initiatives for evaluation by the jury.

We provided the retailers with a structured template to present the initiative. The template forced them to argue on each criterion why the initiative is “award worthy”. It was nice to see how this process triggered internal debate within these companies on which of their initiatives was already generating significant impact.

By the beginning of October, we received 11 submissions from the 5 retailers who have a national presence in Belgium.

Now it was time for our jury to get into action. For our jury members, we could largely rely on the experts that were involved in the creation of the admission document (step 1). The evaluation and nomination process consisted of three steps.

First, we sent the documents of all initiatives to each jury member individually, accompanied by a scoring table, covering the criteria of the admission document.

Then the jury met for a long afternoon meeting. The individual scores served as input for the initial discussions on which initiatives would be nominated for the award or not. The jury left the room with 2 definitive nominations. For 4 initiatives, the jury formulated additional questions for the retailers.

Finally, after evaluating the additional information, the jury nominated one extra initiative, resulting in 3 final nominations.

Depending on the specific claims that an initiative made (living income for farmers, health, carbon neutrality, etc.) the jury members with the specific domain expertise had a bigger say in the final decision.

The goal of the award was not only to highlight impactful and promising initiatives, but also to bring the complex topic of food sustainability to a wider audience in an accessible way.

Therefore, we collaborated with De Standaard, a leading newspaper in the Flemish part of Belgium. They did a three-day coverage, in which they performed a screening of each nominated initiative. Experts of the nominated retailers were interviewed on the opportunities and challenges they face when mainstreaming sustainability.

For each initiative, a member of the jury explained why the initiative met the strict criteria that were established in step 1.

At the time of publication, De Standaard also launched an online voting tool and invited readers to cast their vote for their favorite initiative.

In total 3260 people casted their vote, which is comparable to other polls organized in this way by the same newspaper. The initiative of Colruyt turned out as the winner of the public vote.

For the official proclamation of our award, we were happy to partner with Gondola, the monthly magazine for professionals in food retail in Belgium. During their Personality of the year-event, the I’m more than my receipt-award was one of the three awards that were presented.

The audience of leaders in retailers and food companies made a perfect match to lift the discussion to a higher level. The four award winners were asked to bring a question to the table. Alain Boulle (Intermarché) and Xavier Piesvaux (Delhaize) - both voted as personality of the year – made the perfect introduction to our award, by raising the question: What do we need to do to reconcile citizens, who demand sustainability, with consumers, who demand low prices?

Gondola then offered us the opportunity to present the campaign and the process behind our award in a five-minute talk. At the end of the talk, we held our own little Oscar moment: and the award goes to… Colruyt.

In its February edition, Gondola published a dedicated "#GreenMonth"-edition, focussing on sustainability in retail. The I'm more than my receipt-award also got some nice coverage.

The award triggered attention and discussion among retailers and sustainability professionals alike. It provided retailers with an opportunity to raise attention on initiatives that are often not well known, or that - too easily - face the criticism of “greenwashing”. Thanks to the criteria document and the diverse perspectives of our jury, a kind of unofficial standard was set for ambitious sustainability initiatives. Could it serve as a tool for other organisations? That’s certainly something we want to explore further.

The journalistic investment of De Standaard raised the stakes to participate in the award and managed to introduce the topic of sustainability mainstreaming in all its complexities to a wider audience.

What’s next? Can we repeat the award in 2020? Do we keep a broad angle, or do we need to focus on specific aspects of sustainability?

And can we look beyond Belgium? We’re eager to find out about retail initiatives in other countries that aim to mainstream sustainable food. How can we work together to accelerate this movement? We sure welcome your feedback and ideas.

Reach out to us via mail or comment on our LinkedIn page.