Draw beer yourself or pour the mineral water into your own bottle: this is now possible in some Coop branches. For example in the Basler Südpark or in the Baden AG train station. The beer comes from the Feldschlösschen brew kettle, the mineral water from Rhäzünser.
The campaign is a step towards reducing packaging waste. From the summer, Coop will test further filling stations. For liquid detergents and dishwashing detergents and for long-life foods such as rice or oat flakes.
Coop is thus following its biggest competitor. Migros introduced a number of unpacked stations last year. Test way. Just a few days ago, she announced that the pilot had worked so well that she was now expanding her unpackaged range to other regions and stores.
30,000 tons of material saved
With the unpackaged range, the two retailers are responding to the increasing environmental awareness of their customers. The retailers do everything in their power to repeatedly demonstrate their commitment to climate protection.
According to the communiqué, Coop has already reduced or optimized over 30,000 tonnes of packaging material. Migros states that it has saved over 42,500 one-way packaging since the introduction of its packaging-free stations last autumn.
But is the unpackaged range really more environmentally friendly? Yes, says a Coop spokeswoman on request. Because the food is transported in much larger containers, which not only saves packaging material in the final sale, but also in storage and transport.
“That does not work”
Olivier Richard, founder of the French-speaking Swiss franchising Chez Mamie, which is committed to the sale of sustainable and unpackaged products, does not believe the commitment of the two retailers to be credible: “They do it to earn money because they sense increasing demand. But that doesn’t work, ”he claims.
Because in unpackaged shops it is not just profit that rules: “We also have an ethical and philosophical concept behind it that we want to protect the planet and pay the producers in an absolutely fair way,” he says. That simply cannot be achieved through large-scale production.
Nevertheless, Richard does not want to completely demonize the commitment of the retailers: he thinks it is basically good that they draw attention to the issue of “unpackaged”.
Conscious consumption
Iris Huber, founder of the packaging-free shop Bare Ware from Winterthur ZH is pleased that with the entry of retailers, the sale of unpackaged products is more widely diversified. But she also emphasizes that the commitment must not stop there.
“In addition to reducing waste, we unpackaged shops have far greater goals that we are continuously working on,” says Huber.
In addition to fair and sustainable production, this also includes conscious consumption and the avoidance of food waste. “That is why we only offer perishable products in small quantities,” says the entrepreneur. (SDA / ise)