【CSR case study】Why did Carrefour Foundation Taiwan launch Carrefour Impact Store in Taipei?
Carrefour Impact Store is a good example of how this MNC connects its core business with its vision to influence social responsibility widely, step by step.
Four years ago, when I joined Carrefour Taiwan, the first Carrefour Foundation activity I attended was “1919 Food Bank” volunteer to unpack tons of donated rice and repack into small household packages in order to send out to families who need support. The second activity was the beach cleanup in New Taipei city. What I had in mind about Carrefour Foundation Taiwan was they arrange volunteer work for their employees to join.
However, things have changed in 2018.
Carrefour Group CEO, Alexandre Bompard, announced the implementation of “Food Transformation Plan” globally. What is Food Transformation Plan? Quoted from Alexandre Bompard:“The group’s ambition is to lead the food transition … This is a big challenge. We absolutely must prove our new positioning to the customer through very strong, precise and coherent actions.” The main reason of implementing the 5-year “Food Transformation Plan”, can be explained: nowadays, the “Millennial” generation, the generation has been growing to become the main consumer power, opt for healthier diets and a more socially responsible way of life, retailers and other consumer goods providers need to find a way to better adapt to Millennial generation’s preferences in terms of choosing their daily shopping goods.
Carrefour Food Transformation Plan makes Carrefour Foundation Taiwan makes further moves, includes Carrefour Impact Store now launched in Taipei.
We should take a close look on what they have done in social responsibility aligned with Food Transformation Plan.
(1) Recruit Carrefour CSR Heroes
Carrefour Foundation starts to recruit their “CSR Heroes” internally as Carrefour Foundation ambassadors, which I think is a brilliant idea. Basically, this idea is to encourage employees, who believe in Carrefour Foundation visions about food transformation, animal welfare, anti-waste, healthy living sustainable agriculture, and community services to be CSR Heroes. By joining the CSR Heroes project, of which I was a member, Carrefour Foundation gives training programs for CSR Hero members to have clear views of the visions that Carrefour Foundation works on in order to explain to their own departments and teams. This way, to really connect CSR visions with employees. Through the employees, especially associates who work in store and engage consumers all the time, the CSR Heroes project delivers ideas from employees to consumers.
(2) Implement cage-free egg in Carrefour Taiwan
One of Carrefour Foundation’s visions is to support animal welfare. What we eat is what we are means: what food we choose to buy defines what we are, too. If you have ever watched how the traditional cage chickens were treated to lay eggs before the sale of clean well-packed eggs in supermarket near your home, you would be surprised how stressed those chickens are. Four chickens in one A4 size cage! It of course reduces the average production cost per egg. However, are those eggs produced by stressed chickens healthy? The answer is no and it is against animal welfare.
What I find Carrefour Foundation doing is they are not just supporting the cage-free egg farmers by donations, but also make efforts to implement cage-free eggs to be sold in Carrefour Taiwan stores. As for farmers who work on cage-free eggs production, they have much higher cost of caring chickens, which means selling price would be higher than traditional cage eggs. They need marketing resources and channels to educate consumers. Carrefour Foundation Taiwan provides the resources and channels for them to articulate their belief and help farmers to earn profits in order to continue what they are doing to change the world.
(3) Launching Carrefour Impact Store
This summer, Carrefour Foundation launched their Carrefour Impact Store in Taipei, which only uses secondhand furniture or recycled materials to build up store decorations and display shelves. Carrefour Impact Store literally combines visions that we mentioned above, makes those visions real and physically present in our society.
When you come into Carrefour Impact Store in Taipei, you will see products such as organic items, fair-trade milk, and cage-free eggs. No plastic shopping bag provided. They offer reusable paper bags if you forget to bring your shopping bag. They even prepare cups and forks for you to do food tasting without consuming disposable tableware. By launching Carrefour Impact Store, through interactive shopping experience, Carrefour Foundation Taiwan delivers its sustainable development visions to consumers. The store concept, which I quoted from Carrefour Taiwan announcement about Carrefour Impact Store, is to “bring the customers’ attention towards responsible agriculture, healthy living, and animal welfare. To act for easier accessibility to better life.”
“The power of change, starting from ourselves.”
If you agree with Carrefour Foundation visions in agriculture, healthy living, and animal welfare, you will be delighted and inspired like I am since the first time I walked into this concept store. Carrefour Impact Store is sharing visions worthy for us to carry and continue to better everyone’s life.
Visit Carrefour Impact Store:
№2, Sec. 3, Chongqing S. Rd., Zhongzheng Dist., Taipei City 100, Taiwan
