Sustainability in Retail
Helping retailers reduce risk, strengthen supply chains, meet regulatory requirements, and turn sustainability into a source of commercial advantage.
Sustainability in retail is no longer a reporting obligation sitting outside the core business. For retailers, it is directly linked to profitability, supply chain resilience, customer trust, and long-term growth. As reporting requirements and stakeholder expectations continue to evolve, organisations need practical approaches that balance compliance with commercial priorities.
Acclaro Advisory works with retailers across grocery, fashion, and general merchandise to develop sustainability strategies, strengthen supply chains, improve ESG reporting, and deliver measurable business value.
Grocery & Food Retail
Supermarkets, convenience retail, food service, and online grocery
Protecting margins, building supply chain resilience, and reducing food system risk—while meeting the reporting and sourcing obligations that regulators and investors are now enforcing.
Food retailers face increasing pressure from climate risk, food waste, packaging regulation, and complex sourcing requirements. We help organisations manage sustainability across the value chain while protecting margins and strengthening supply resilience.
We support organisations to:
- Identify the true cost of food waste across stores, distribution, and supply chains and design targeted reduction programmes that improve margins and meet mandatory reporting requirements
- Map agricultural sourcing risk linked to climate, water, biodiversity, and deforestation and develop practical mitigation strategies that protect long-term supply continuity
- Pinpoint the emissions hotspots driving cost and risk across operations and supply chains, including refrigerant losses and cold chain logistics, and build credible reduction programmes
- Set science-based targets and net zero roadmaps that reflect the full food system, including land use, soil carbon, and nature-related impacts
- Design supplier engagement programmes that improve traceability and sustainability performance without placing unsustainable compliance burdens on smaller producers
- Complete double materiality assessments aligned to CSRD and ESRS, covering climate, biodiversity, water, and social impacts across the value chain
Fashion & Apparel Retail
Fashion, clothing, footwear, accessories, and luxury retail
Building brand credibility, reducing supply chain risk, and designing commercially viable circular models in a sector where consumer scrutiny and regulatory pressure are both intensifying.
Sustainability is now a key driver of brand reputation, consumer trust and regulatory compliance in the fashion sector. We help retailers build transparency, reduce supply chain risk and develop credible circularity strategies.
We support organisations to:
- Strengthen supply chain transparency and traceability in a way that reduces labour rights and environmental risk—and provides the evidence to support public commitments that hold up to scrutiny
- Design circular business models—including take-back schemes, resale, rental, and recycled materials—that are commercially viable, not just operationally feasible
- Substantiate environmental product claims in a way that protects brand reputation and meets the EU Green Claims Directive—reducing the risk of regulatory challenge or consumer backlash
- Get ahead of Digital Product Passport requirements by building the data infrastructure and supplier engagement needed to comply without disrupting product and commercial operations
- Delivery net zero strategies, CSRD reporting and double materiality assessments
General Merchandise & Specialty Retail
Home goods, electronics, DIY, sporting goods, health & beauty, and online retail
Managing product sustainability risk, improving procurement performance, and building the compliance capability needed across a diverse and technically complex product portfolio.
Retailers operating across multiple product categories face growing challenges around product compliance, responsible sourcing and supply chain transparency. E-waste, chemical compliance, ecodesign requirements and supply chain due diligence all create increasing regulatory and reputational risk, particularly for organisations operating across multiple markets.
We support organisations to:
- Identify product-level sustainability risk across categories
- Build supply chain due diligence programmes that address human rights and environmental risks, meet mandatory reporting requirements, and strengthen procurement relationships
- Get ahead of ecodesign requirements and product-level EPR obligations—reducing future compliance cost by designing sustainability into the product strategy now
- Complete double materiality assessments aligned to CSRD and ESRS
- Strengthen board-level decision-making on climate, product, and supply chain risk—making sustainability a visible part of governance, not a separate workstream
- Set net zero strategies and science-based targets that reflect the reality of multi-category retail operations
The questions shaping sustainability at board level
Retail leaders are grappling with sustainability challenges now directly linked to business performance, regulatory compliance, and investor confidence. The questions we hear most often from senior executives include:
- How do we meet our reporting obligations without creating a cost and compliance burden that distracts from running the business?
- How do we improve supply chain transparency without causing unnecessary cost and complexity?
- How do we turn net zero commitments into measurable emissions reductions?
- How do we substantiate sustainability claims and avoid greenwashing risk?
- How do we use sustainability as a source of commercial differentiation and long-term value?
We help retail organisations answer these questions with practical, senior-led advice—connecting sustainability to the business outcomes that matter to boards, investors, and customers.
Need support with your sustainability challenges?
Get in touch to arrange an initial discussion with one of our senior advisers.
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