Weis Markets Achieves First Sustainable Food Retail Certification; R. Kevin Small and Peter Cooke Comment
SUNBURY, PA - Reaching another impressive milestone in its sustainability strategy, Weis Markets announced that it recently achieved Ratio Institute’s Sustainable Food Retail Certification. With consumers ever on the lookout for more environmentally friendly options on grocery shelves, now they can celebrate the fact that the entire Weis chain of more than 197 stores are sustainably certified, making Weis one of the first food retailers to achieve this status.
“Since 2008, we’ve steadily expanded and refined our sustainability program, particularly with reducing refrigerant usage and food waste along with conserving energy,” said R. Kevin Small, Weis Markets Vice President of Development. “This has helped make us a more efficient company and allowed us to reduce our impact on the communities we serve. It is important to note this achievement was made possible by the work of thousands of Weis associates.”
In order to achieve this milestone, Weis successfully completed the requirements for Steward Tier certification. According to a press release, this demonstrates the company’s commitment to being a sustainable food retailer as well as its efforts to continuously improve its sustainability performance.
The Sustainable Food Retail Certification program was created to help food retailers reach operational excellence while also meeting sustainability goals by benchmarking performance, increasing margins, and reducing costs. This happens by the program assessing a retailer’s practices across its operations, verifying them, and awarding certification based on points earned and compliance.
“Weis Markets is an excellent example of an industry leader. Weis continually demonstrates the value of sustainable operations for food retail,” noted Peter Cooke, Director of Programs and Partnerships for Ratio Institute. “For many years, Weis has been implementing sustainable operations, reducing impact, and saving money. As a community leader, Weis communicates the importance of sustainability to their customers and employees.”
As part of this certification, food retailers also are given the additional benefit of insights into cost savings from operational sustainability efforts; revenue-generating sustainability opportunities; employee engagement opportunities; and metrics on waste, water, energy, and other efficiency measures.
Cheers to Weis Markets on reaching this impressive milestone!
