Turning trends into opportunities: Kingfisher Group/Brico Depôt 

From its purpose of 'Better Homes, Better Lives' Kingfisher Group tries to help and inspire its customers to improve their homes through retail brands such as B&Q and Castorama. One of the brands the company owns and operates is a retail DIY chain called Brico Depôt with stores in France, Spain, Portugal and Romania.

Its Spanish HR Director Albert Aranda illustrated how Brico Depôt deals with the 5 global trends that were identified for Kingfisher companies as relevant: changing demographics, greater urbanisation, increased home technology, higher energy consumption and higher environmental regulation. Within its long term vision of becoming Net Positive in 2050, priorities are set based upon a 'commercial model' that translates trends into business opportunities. These opportunities drive differentiation, revenue, engagement and cost reduction in areas such as timber, innovation, energy reduction and community-engagement. Brico’s roadmap is framed as follows:

Re-using existing solutions: Sustainia

Laura Storm, Executive Director of Danish think tank Sustania, identifies readily available sustainability solutions across the world and demonstrates the potential impacts and benefits. Laura took the participants into her world: Sustania, a fictitious island which contains a large part of the most frequently found economies on our planet.

On the island the inhabitants are trying to find solutions based upon 6 main trends:

• Responsible supply chains
• Circular economy
• Rethinking consumer behaviour
• Water efficiency
• Sharing economy
• Big data & data analytics

Over the last three years, Sustainia has built a comprehensive database of sustainability solutions from every corner of the globe. 

From linear to circular economy strategy: Philips

Circular economy is a systematic change, a strategic move with a drastic impact on your business model and the whole value chain. It is a change in the consumer’s mindset: from ownership to access, from buying to leasing, and from selling to providing services. Lara Noivo Fernandes, Global Manager at Philips Lighting shared her experience on how the company incorporates a circular economy strategy.

Lara spoke about Philips’ vision of improving the lives of 3 billion people a year by 2025, and deriving from there the urgent need for transforming the linear economy into a circular economy. As a partner of the Ellen McArthur Foundation, the Philips Healthcare refurbishment business and the recycle activities for Philips lighting use the “Repair, reuse, refurbish and recycle” approach, in which Philips tries to close the materials loop.  

Kick-start sustainable innovation 

Are you interested in driving sustainable innovation from developing new business models and making your brand future proof? Please contact Jan van der Kaaij, Managing Partner at jan@finchandbeak.com or call +31 6 28 02 18 80.