Aldi’s new eco concept store in Royal Leamington Spa is now open. It is the first time the supermarket has designed a store with the objective of significantly reducing carbon consumption.
The sustainable building materials and design changes are estimated to reduce life-cycle carbon emissions by up to two-thirds. In addition to changes to the fabric of the building, the Leamington Spa store aims to make it easier for shoppers to reduce, reuse and recycle, with numerous plastic-reduction initiatives being trialled.
Successful elements may then be rolled out to other stores across the country, many existing Aldi stores have taken these initiatives in stride already.
The new store includes:
A ‘hard to recycle’ unit, at the store entrance, for items not collected by local authorities such as coffee pods, medicine packets, batteries, soft plastics, and cosmetic packaging
Nuts and coffee refill fixture, helping customers to shop more sustainably and at lower prices, using their own containers or free FSC-certified paper bags
Sustainable building materials, including timbre fibre insulation, cement replacement concrete, recycled lighting columns, low temperature tarmac and a partial green roof
Energy saving initiatives such as solar panels and chiller doors to reduce energy consumption with graphics to communicate their energy-saving credentials
Redesign of the building structure to help reduce overall energy demand by 57% compared with a traditional store
Car park equipped with dedicated Electric Vehicle Charging Ports, with capacity to expand these in the future
We have worked with Aldi’s team to implement changes to the traditional store design that will reduce life-cycle carbon emissions and improve the site’s ecological credentials. Whilst doing this, Aldi’s core identity remains in all the products we know and love.
Crucially, the changes are designed to be commercially viable as well as better for the environment, giving the supermarket the ability to roll the new elements out in future while maintaining its price promise to customers.
