Avoiding, reducing, and improving packaging

REWE is doing away with the additional plastic lid on all 500-gram cups of natural yoghurt and on all 500-gram cups of soy yoghurt of the private labels “ja!” and “REWE Beste Wahl”. With this decision, REWE saves more than 69 tonnes of plastic waste annually.

PENNY will be the first supermarket in Germany to introduce a uniform IFCO reusable bucket for its cut flower range from 2023. The changeover will save up to 140 tonnes of plastic per year.

By changing their transport processes, REWE and PENNY are now able to offer both organic and conventional cucumbers without plastic wrap all year round, saving up to 170 tonnes of plastic per year.

Since 2017, REWE and PENNY have only sold bananas without packaging, saving more than 210 tonnes of plastic per year. Information about the product can be found on labels and banderoles.

In summer 2016, REWE stopped giving out plastic carrier bags at all of its supermarkets; an example that was soon followed by Penny, toom Baumarkt and DER Touristik. At REWE Group we are thereby saving more than 202 million bags every year. Instead, our supermarkets and stores offer alternative reusable carrier bags, jute bags and cardboard boxes.

REWE is the first of the four largest food retailers in Germany to offer organic fruit and vegetables almost entirely without plastic or with improved packaging at more than 3,600 supermarkets. This helps us to save 210 tonnes of plastic and 80 tonnes of paper every year. PENNY is also switching its organic fruit and vegetables to plastic-free packaging or zero packaging where possible, which, in the long term, will allow savings of up to 50 tonnes of plastic every year.