Towards circularity
By Sarah Schaefer, VP for Sustainability (Europe), Electrolux
At Electrolux our commitment to sustainability has a long tradition – in fact, with our Swedish heritage, is part of our DNA. What is more recent, is that it is increasingly becoming a crucial driver at the point of sale for many consumers who want to make more sustainable choices in their everyday lives.
According to our research, 52% of people consider themselves to be climate conscious and want to make a difference but they do not always know how. This is why we are so passionate about empowering consumers to close this ‘green gap’ between how they want to live and how they are living – by offering high performance appliances that enable them to save energy, water, and resources. Our aim is to reduce the carbon footprint from the use of sold products by 25% between 2015 and 2025. Not just because it influences their purchasing decision, but also because we know from our life cycle analysis that 85 per cent of an appliance’s impact happens during the user phase.
We take a holistic approach and think about sustainability across all our experience areas. This means that at the core of everything we do has to be the consumer and how we can nudge their behaviour post purchase. If we can help people understand features and functionalities of our products and how to use them to adopt a more conscious, sustainable behaviour, they will in turn have better results for themselves and act better for the environment.
But it is not enough to minimise and optimise our environmental footprint of our products. Because circularity means that we ultimately give back as much as we take from the planet. That is the ultimate goal of sustainable consumption. This needs to be our guiding North Star.
To deliver against this promise of circularity, we are currently not only working on better sustainable packaging, but importantly also extending the life span of our appliances through durability, repairability and ultimately refurbishment. All of these areas will contribute to the consumer experience across the life span of using our products. So, let’s work together to see how we can put the consumer at the heart of everything we do and empower them to be agents of change.
