Welcome to another episode of Retail Reckoning! In today’s show, host Clare Bailey looks into how sustainability and supply chain resilience are no longer just buzzwords - they’re powerful drivers of profit and customer loyalty.

With supply chain disruptions becoming the norm and eco-conscious consumers pushing brands to do better, retailers are faced with new challenges and opportunities.

Clare unpacks the latest risks shaking up the retail landscape, explores the shift towards near shoring and greater transparency, and reveals why greener operations don’t just help the planet—they can boost your bottom line too.

From real-world examples like Aldi and Innocent to actionable steps for building trust and trimming waste, this episode is packed with insights for anyone ready to future-proof their retail business and win over the next wave of customers.

Click play and discover how thinking green can help you stay in the black!

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Sustainability isn't just a gimmick, it's a profit driver. And if

you're not sustainable and your competition are, you're going to miss out

on customers who'll move over to those who can make them feel like it's easy

work to do the right thing.

Supply chains and sustainability aren't luxury add ons, they're

frontline strategy. Disruption is baseline.

Eco consciousness is a profit defense. Name your

top three supply chain risks right now without potential closing. Go.

Okay, so permanent disruption, what does that really mean?

47% of UK businesses have reported disruption in the past year,

with 60% saying supply line was more brittle than ever.

Drivers are inflation as declared in mid August

at 3.8%. Energy costs, Ukraine, war,

Red Sea issues. It's coming out of all sources

and we know as the industry that stock issues

are a major problem. Retailers have lost

billions. Delayed stock, disrupted inventory,

cyber attacks. M and S claim they lost around

300 million and a billion

off their valuation, according to AP News, due to

everything that happened to them. We've got to build redundancy,

diversify supplier base and scenario plan for disruption

because disruption is no longer uncommon. It's

the norm. And what does that even mean? What we need to look at

is being more nimble and being able to pivot. There's a couple

of brands who I've noted are working more on near

Shoring. What I mean by that is they're not reliant on

routes out of China, India, Pakistan and so on.

They're near shoring, perhaps to Europe and the UK.

Fat Face and Jules. The PwC

have noted that retail tech investment is up 10% year on year

for things like point of sale, inventory planning,

AI forecasting and lean operations. So

lots of the businesses in this sector, the bigger guys,

are finding ways to be more flexible,

I guess, and more able to respond to the chaos

that we see in the world. I mean, we haven't even talked about tariffs.

Near Shoring appears to be the best choice for

now. It may change in the future. But if you can get

UK or relatively close EU supply

and that there is some level of security

of the supply chain, that would be the best option. Despite it

probably being higher cost on the product. But is it

really higher cost? When you think about the cost of lost

inventory, containers stuck in the Red Sea, containers being

hijacked and so on, it feels sometimes like the world's gone a bit

mad. So my advice would be to test regional

and more local options, investing in

much more transparency about the supply chain and speed of

supply. So you've got much more agility, meaning

if a product takes off and you're on a six month lead time from China,

you can't respond. But if you're on a one month lead time from say,

France, you can. You need to reduce reliance on single points

of failure. That's been the case for supply chains for years. And with the way

things are in the global economies, there is no other

choice but to really work on creating some

level of resilience and also much closer sourcing

options. The other

thing when it comes to supply chains is people are looking at

carbon miles. They're far more cautious,

let's say, about where they spend than they ever were.

Certainly Gen Z. And they are the next generation of

consumers. They may not have the spending power just yet, but they

are your next wave of customers. So I think you need to use

sustainability as a profit engine. 64% of

UK customers are saying they will pay more for green,

whatever that means to them. I mean, you know, define that, but

the point is a third are already switching to

brands because of their ethics and that's coming out of people like

Vogue Business and so on. We do know there is a

growing and burgeoning trend towards

greener and more sustainable products and services.

Aldi have ditched non recyclable packaging by 2026

according to their statements. And I think that that says an awful lot

because as a lower cost provider they are moving

towards also being a lower cost and most

ethical provider. Now, Ms. Have had plan A for many,

many years because there is no plan B. But it's true

if the businesses tell their shoppers

that by shopping with them you're doing the right thing for the planet

without even trying. It drives loyalty, it makes the

lazy consumer much more aligned to our brand.

Yes, you've got the zero waste shops where you can take something and refill

it and so on, but that's more hassle y than Aldi telling

us that they'll have no non recyclable packaging. M and s

telling us everything they do is going to be as green as possible because that

just makes our lives that bit easier. So I would say for any business, large

or small, you've got to make your sustainability

credentials visible and you need

to translate it into the marketing and in store experience. Sell the

story. I've seen some brilliant imagery in co ops.

I was in Lincolnshire at the time, so I think it would be under Lincolnshire

co op. All credit to them. They had images of wind turbines in

the toilets, but it sold the story and it was

everywhere. And you felt like by shopping with them you were doing the right

thing. I would say if you can make your customers

feel like by shopping with you they are doing the right thing, then you're going

to win. That kind of

leads us to storytelling versus trust.

If you've got information about something, sustainability,

supply chains, ethical purchasing and so on, whether that

be through trained staff, QR codes on products that

someone can click to find out more, labels which carry the

clear messaging, I think there's a red tractor, isn't there, in the sustainability

for food and so on. All of that goes a long way.

And I think one of the brands that I feel is the most innovative

in this or certainly has been a leader is

Innocent. Because you'd get your little smoothie with telling a story. It's

got a funky picture on it sometimes. It wore a little woolly hat

too, which is quite funny and innocent. Told us about

where the food had come from and it told us about how it was made

and so on. And more and more brands are doing that now and

I can see a quiet shift towards

those brands that feel more honest and

more aligned to our personal values and our care

for the planet, for those of us that care. So my advice on

this is you need to be really authentic.

Customers have got to see you as real. You need to make sure that

staff are well trained so that if customers talk to them, they know

exactly how to get across the positioning, the messaging and

tell the story and even down to products and

labeling. It needs to somehow relate them back to something that

they can buy into. Not just because

it's a good value for money product or because it's

something they fancy buying, but because when they buy

it, it makes them feel good about themselves. And that's

really, really important. Similarly linked to

my earlier episode, I just want to reinforce that

heritage doesn't mean impunity because

despite the fact a company may have been going for years,

literally hundreds of years, the evidence from Woolworths,

Debenhams, Clares, River Island, WH

Smith, it proves that being trusted

isn't enough and that the legacy of those businesses in the

years they've traded isn't protection against the economic stresses

everybody's feeling these days, we need to constantly

reevaluate and pivot businesses where necessary

because consumers expectations are changing.

So what more could those businesses have done? For example, to show

that they were reducing wastage, that they were being more sustainable? What

stories were they not telling that they might have been able to tell.

And that's the sad fact. Lots of businesses

almost become complacent and think, well, you know, we've been around for years,

we're doing really well, but they're not telling the stories that are relevant to

today and to today's customer. And unfortunately, that

means they're losing their customers to other people.

The other issue I've got with supply chains is wastage.

Wastage is basically lost profit. 40%

of retailers reported cost savings in the first year of their

eco investments by looking at lean packaging

and inventory management in a much more focused lens.

Because less waste was better margin. It

stands to reason that's what the Japanese car industry did

in, I believe, the 80s or 90s with the kaizen culture.

They worked on kaizen, which meant reduced waste.

I think the word for it was muda. Kaizen,

or total quality management, as it became known, was all about

reducing waste to increase profitability. And that's why the Japanese car

industry did so well. And simply by

doing the right thing, you can actually increase profits. But the

principle is you invest in lean

packaging, lean inventory and eco

efficiency and you will make more profit. It stands to

reason. You can tell the eco story on your social media, your

website, your blog, your packaging and so on, but you also make more money.

So my advice would be look at your waste, optimize your stock

levels, make sure your supply chain is efficient and functional, and remove

inefficiencies that are going to leak margin effectively. It's all

about auditing past errors, shoring up the supply

chain, getting rid of dross, as we said in one of the earlier

episodes, making sure that you eliminate the long tail of

underperforming products, small operational fixes,

but many of them result in significant financial

gains later. So to wrap up,

supply and sustainability aren't just corporate social responsibility,

they are power plays. Relying on heritage

leaky supply chain and forgetting to tell your story,

that's your decline path. Retail winners this year and

next are pivoting packaging. Well, persuading

customers and convincing people that by buying from

them, they're doing the right thing as well as satisfying their own needs.

I'm Claire Bailey, retail champion, and you've been listening to Retail reckoning.

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