Sustainable Lifestyle

Preventing biodiversity loss (2023)

To ensure access to nature’s resources for future generations, we must preserve biodiversity, which is our heritage. To actively participate in the pursuit of the goals set out in the global forum, we implemented a Biodiversity Policy in 2023. The Policy sets out the general principles of conduct for the protection of biodiversity, and also indicates the main directions of activities in this area, aimed at ensuring the protection of ecosystems and preventing the loss of biodiversity including counteracting deforestation. The policy applies to both Żabka Polska and its franchisees, as well as the suppliers of own brands.

Our commitments have led us to take a closer look at our supply chain. Starting in 2023, we now only accept branded products with certified palm oil, further contributing to the preservation of rainforests and wildlife habitats. We have taken steps to improve animal welfare and promote sustainable sourcing in our own-brand products. We have removed cage-laid eggs from our offerings and implemented policies to regulate the commodities used in our products, ensuring sustainable sourcing for plant ingredients, fish and seafood.

Helping to transform the nutrition landscape

With Żabka research, carried out in 2020, showing that nearly 70% of Polish adults regularly buy ready-to-eat meals, we feel highly responsible for the quality of the diets consumed by the families of the 3 million people who shop in our stores every day.

This is what lay behind the Porcja DobreGO! nutrition programme, and the Spróbuj DobreGO! campaign, launched in early July 2023 and designed to help those customers with time and lifestyle constraints that can restrict their ability to make the right food choices for their health and the environment.

The overall programme was carefully designed to show consumers that healthy composition is not incompatible with delicious flavours. With the aim of meeting multiple different taste preferences and lifestyle needs across our private-label range – including Plant Hunter, Szamamm, Tomcio Paluch and Dobra Karma – it not only marked those foods with a high A or B Nutri-Score rating with a special Porcja DobreGO! label. It also provided users of the Żappka mobile app with a discount of more than 25% on those selected products.

This unique initiative not only ensured that shoppers had ever-better access instore to well-balanced ready-made meals and snacks, created under the guidance of a professional nutritionist, as we observed an 85% increase in sales of products with Nutri-Score A&B after launching the Spróbuj DobreGO! campaing. It also provided younger consumers with the opportunity to learn about healthy and balanced eating through playing the game Żabka Run: Porcja DobreGO! on the global online Roblox platform.

This first season of the game used innovation to encourage a lifelong healthy approach to food by teaching players how to use the Nutri-Score system in their everyday shopping and so understand the nutritional profile of ready meals.

Co-created with the Game Changer agency, and with influencers selected by BeLoud, the game required players who hit obstacles while playing to answer a question on good nutrition before they could start playing again. It also featured a futuristic version of a Żabka store as part of an environment in which players use jet backpacks to move, avoiding obstacles and buying items to make their gameplay easier.

According to Anna Grabowska, EVP, Managing Directorof Żabka International at Żabka Group, ‘Initiatives like the Porcja DobreGO! programme are designed to make life easier for our customers while restricting our negative impact on the environment. We are on the verge of a global nutritional transformation, and Żabka always aims to be where the needs of consumers are.’

Download PDF

Targeting sustainable living: for everybody, all the time

We always aim to support our customers’ sustainable nutrition, ensuring that it’s good both for them and for the planet. To ensure this, we continuously implement a series of measures that are framed by our Animal Welfare Policy and our Policy of Sustainable Sourcing of Raw Vegetable Materials, Fish and Seafood.

At the beginning of 2022, we removed from sale eggs from cage-reared chickens. We decided to go a step further in 2023, by also eliminating their use as a main ingredient in our Own Brand products. We want laying hens whose eggs we sell and are used in our products to live in spaces that allow them to express their natural behaviours, and for their living conditions to be as close as possible to their natural environment. Cage rearing allows neither of these aims.

Our Animal Welfare Policy involves making changes to how farm animals are treated. We base our approach to humane treatment on the requirements of the ISO TS 34700:2016 standard, as expressed in the five ‘Freedom Principles’ included in our policy. We have decided to apply these principles to all Own Brand products that contain meats including poultry, beef and pork. These principles cover:

1. providing animals with access to water and a healthy diet
2. enabling a comfortable environment and resting place
3. caring for animal health, preventing pain and diseases
4. allowing the expression of natural behaviours, and
5. providing protection against fear and distress.

At Żabka, we are aware of the importance of the considerate treatment of animals. We want our customers to be certain when choosing Own Brand products that they come from sources that guarantee respect for animals. We are also aware that healthy and safe food can only come from healthy animals. This is why we have determined that all fish and seafood in our Own Brand products must have ASC/MSC/BAP certification, which guarantees their traceability and ensures they come from sources that are both sustainable and legal.

Our actions are not limited to animal-derived products. We are aware that plant-based products can also have a strong impact on ecosystems. We therefore eliminated palm oil from use in our Own Brand products in 2019, and in 2021 introduced a Sustainable Palm Oil Policy stating that all other products in our stores contain only RSPO-certified palm oil. Since 2023, all our Own Brand products containing coffee use raw materials covered by Rainforest Alliance 2020 certification.

We know that there is still much more we can do in this area. We plan to further extend our approach to cage-reared eggs, fully eradicating their use as derivative ingredients and semi-finished products in all our Own Brand products. We also aim to ensure over the same timeframe that the tea and cocoa used in our Own Brand products has Rainforest Alliance 2020 certification. Our ultimate aim is to create the conditions for sustainable living for everybody, every day.

Pioneering coffee scheme sets the standards for service and value

In a step to continue differentiating itself by offering the highest levels of customer service and value, Żabka has become the first Polish retailer to offer a coffee-subscription service at a monthly cost of just PLN 49.99.

This enables consumers who elect to have any coffee once a day for 30 days to pay an average of just over PLN 1.61 per cup. This is made possible because Żabka stores are open on Sundays and public holidays. In addition, any customer who uses up the daily limit is eligible once during the subscription period to receive a free muffin or a 200ml coffee from an instore machine. Importantly, this new service is enabling Żabka to plan a range of other subscription-based offers to provide exceptional value based on using the unique Żappka app. All users need to do is launch the app, select coffee from the list of subscription schemes, activate it, select their payment method and pay. The service has proved itself to be an immediate success among customers. In the first month following launch, Żabka sold more than 6,500 subscriptions.

Good package

We made the decision to end the pilot of the "Good Package" program at the end of July 2023. This was one of the elements of the comprehensive "WE DON'T WASTE" program, as part of which Żabka is testing various solutions to prevent food waste throughout the product life chain. We are currently noticing increased interest in the stationary sale with special "WE DON'T WASTE" tags for products with expiration dates.

Following the successful completion of the pilot launched at the end of 2021, in August 2022 we expanded the "Good Package" special service to reach more customers through additional stores in Poznań and Wrocław. It was available in more than 1,000 Żabka stores.

“The Simple Solution to Non-Waste" service allowed customers to purchase for half the price a package, consisting of two or three wholesome products, on their last day of shelf life. Interestingly, before purchasing, customers only knew the category of products included in the package and knew that the "surprise package" came in Vegan, Vege and Mix variants, so as to satisfy every consumer's appetite. Since its launch, the popularity of the service has grown, which led us to decide to increase the number of outlets where it is available.

The benefits were not only to counter food waste. It is also lowering the cost of living and an opportunity for franchisees to increase sales and reduce the cost of disposing of food after its expiration date.

We are repairing shoes within a partnership with woshwosh

Together with woshwosh, the first company in Europe focusing on shoe circularity and collaborating with local cobblers to revive this dying craft, we extend the lifespan of our customers' shoes by several seasons, thereby collectively supporting the natural environment. Cleaning or repair services for footwear can be ordered in-store, through the website, or via the application. Customers can choose individual services or attractive cleaning and repair packages at competitive prices. Shoes should be brought to the selected Żabka store when ordering the service and collected from the same location.

Through this collaboration, we demonstrate our commitment to promoting the zero-waste concept and popularizing shoe cleaning and repair as alternatives to frequent new purchases. Cleaning and repairing shoes, compared to buying new ones, result in savings of up to 95 percent in CO2 emissions! By choosing the shoe cleaning service provided by Żabka and woshwosh instead of washing them in a washing machine, it is possible to reduce the carbon footprint by up to 93 percent! The production of one pair of shoes releases an average of 14 kg of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere and consumes up to 50 liters of water. On average, a pair of shoes takes about 50 years to decompose. Less than 1 percent of discarded shoes are recycled.

Nutri-Score labelling system

During 2022, we were very proud at Żabka Group to succeed in labelling 100% of our own brand ready-to-eat and ready-to-heat products under the Nutri-Score scheme.

This was a significant step forward in helping our customers make the right purchasing decisions: Nutri-Score is an official, science-based colour-coded food-labelling system, promoted as a candidate to enable uniformity across the European Union and empower people to enjoy well-balanced diets. It does this by indicating at a glance how healthy and nutritious a product is, ranging from A (with plenty of fibre, proteins and vegetables etc) to E (with high levels of saturated fats, sugars, salt and more). Clearly, consumers are encouraged buy products at the healthy end of the spectrum, and research shows that 91% see Nutri-Score as helpful in making the right choices. Close to half (45%) of our own brand products are rated A or B, and this proportion is continuing to improve. To create increased awareness of the system, its value and simplicity, we ran a digital campaign in 2022 with the powerful message: ‘Nutri-Score: it’s a cakewalk ABC’.

0% zone

One of the positive consumer trends on the market is the growing popularity of non-alcoholic beverages, with the low and non-alcoholic beer segment growing by 128 million PLN last year to 1.3 billion PLN.https://www.browary-polskie.pl/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/Rynek-piwa-w-Polsce-w-2022-r..pdf

This is a result of the increasing focus on leading a healthy lifestyle, the desire to avoid long-term health consequences and the changing preferences towards drinking alcoholhttps://www.euromonitor.com/spirits-in-eastern-europe/
report?recid=2273335833965&id=679498 of consumers in the millennial and generation Z segments. This trend is also reflected among Żabka consumers – we noticed a significant increase in the value of sales of non-alcoholic beer compared to the previous year. For a growing group of consumers who appreciate the taste of the product itself rather than the amount of alcohol it contains, we have prepared a special offer in our ‘0% Zone’, marked with blue labels to be easily found onshelf or in cooling cabinets. We offer not only 0% beers such as lager, flavoured or speciality, but also wines and gin. This includes a unique product offer dedicated to our customers, which is solely distributed in Żabka stores.

Food waste reduction in own operations

According to UN’s agenda, the amount of food wasted shall be reduced by half by 2030 (compared to 2014). As a dynamically growing chain with an annual growth rate with more than one thousand new stores, we face challenges connected with managing food waste. Therefore, we are actively seeking solutions that will enable us to reduce food waste in the whole value chain. In 2022 we looked closer at our own operations and implemented effective improvements, which led to 27% reduction of food waste intensity in our own operations. Having in mind goal of reduction -25% till 2025 we don’t stop and plan actions to reduce food waste further till 2030 to be able to reach UN Goal. We expanded our approach to food waste by testing new initiatives in areas with highest losses and now we tend to minimise the causes of waste at each stage of the process, from supply planning, through storage to distribution. We set a reporting process focused on food waste reduction, including daily reporting of reasons for food liquidation and products at risk of expiry. Moreover, thanks to a close cooperation with our suppliers we managed to optimise stock levels of fresh produce and implemented additional quality verification for fruits and vegetables with the possibility of longer release to franchisees without loss of quality.

Revamped version of Szamamm

In 2021, we embarked on a process of changing the ingredients of Szamamm — one of our most popular own brand ranges. Acting in line with our strategic commitments related to good nutrition, we have reduced, by 5%, salt and sugar content the spaghetti Bolognese meal that is highly popular among our customers. We have also reduced, by 5%, salt content in chicken penne. Those recipe reformulations were preceded by positive laboratory tests and tasting trials. We are currently working on reformulating the recipes of other Szamamm line products — 13 additional products have already successfully completed flavor trials conducted by experts and consumers. Their introduction to our offer is conditioned on a positive result of laboratory tests, By the end of 2021, 87.6% of products other than own brand products sold in Żabka stores and containing palm oil, met the requirements of the policy we had adopted. the last stage of the comprehensive recipe reformulation process. The Szamamm brand was the first own brand range with a Nutri-Score label. In 2021, more than 60% meals were labelled with Nutri-Score of A or B.

We have eliminated palm oil

We want our customers’ nutritional choices not only to be good from the health point of view, but also favorable for the planet. That is why we have completely eliminated palm oil from our own brand products. As far as branded products offered by our suppliers are concerned, acting in accordance with the Sustainable Palm Oil Policy, all other products offered in Żabka stores will be allowed to contain only palm oil from certified sources by the end of 2022. The Polish Coalition for Sustainable Palm Oil has decided the RSPO is the best certification scheme currently existing on the market – it guarantees sustainability of crops and an adequate level of protection of the environment, animals, humans and their traditions. By the end of 2021, 87.6% of products other than own brand products sold in Żabka stores and containing palm oil, met the requirements of the policy we had adopted.

Plant Hunter – a 100% plant-based brand

In April 2021, we launched our first 100% plant-based own brand range known as Plant Hunter, actively pursuing our strategic commitment to increase the sales of plant-based products. Customers enjoy a choice of snacks, salads, lunch dishes, ready meals and sweets. In the lunch dishes, meat has been replaced by a GMO-free soy-based product. The recipes of Plant Hunter meals have been developed by professional chefs. The products contain no sweeteners, hardened fats and preservatives. Plant Hunter dishes are suitable for consumption as is, or , in the case of ready meals, after being heated in a microwave. They are a perfect fit with the modern convenience format, offering our customers a fully balanced, plant-based meal that may be enjoyed without long waiting times. The launch of the Plant Hunter brand has won us the second award in the 2021 Plant-Based Game Changer contest organised by RoślinnieJemy.org.

We provide food to those in need

Close cooperation with social welfare organisations finding good use for unsold foodstuffs by effectively distributing them to locations where they are actually needed is one of the methods we rely on to manage the scale of food waste. Products with a short shelf-life date are transferred to, among other places, Caritas, the Federation of Polish Food Banks and the Kamiliańska Social Assistance Mission. Foodstuffs provided to branches of non-governmental organisations are later shipped to local communities via various institutions, such as canteens, social and therapeutic daycare centres and homeless shelters. Żabka products are used there for preparing hot meals. The food is donated directly to individuals and families in the form of packages. We cooperate with our social partners in order to increase the efficiency of distribution of food products to people in need of such a form of support. In 2021, we donated almost 630 tonnes of food to non-profit organisations — 15% more than the year before.

One app, numerous benefits

Each Żappka user receives a personalised offer prepared based on their own shopping history. They are also given the opportunity to collect żapps — points that can be exchanged for selected products, including of the own brand variety, promoting a sustainable lifestyle. Żappka offers also the Żappka Post functionality allowing to monitor the status of and to easily collect any parcels. The process of sending a parcel is simple and convenient. The customer orders the service online, and no labels are required to be printed out. All they have to do is to label the parcel by hand, with the appropriate number generated online, and deliver it to a store of their choice. In 2021, through the app, we conducted the pilot phase of the “Good Package” programme that supports the prevention of food waste in our stores. As far as social engagement is concerned, customers could also use the app to support the initiatives of our choosing. Additionally, the app allows customers shopping at Żabka Nano stores to make purchases in the simplest possible way — by taking products from shelves, without the need to scan and pay at the cash desk. The technology used in the store recognises Żappka users and automatically processes the payment.

Żabka without waiting in line

In 2021, we introduced cash registers which, depending on the mode they are operating in, are capable of playing different roles. These are ordinary cash desks operated daily by store employees. However, after the register’s screen and scanner are turned to face the customer, the devices switches into self-service mode, allowing customers to scan products, read the Żappka code and pay by card. The fact that the cash register may be operated by customers shortens the service time and is a quicker and more convenient form of shopping. It also supports the work of franchisees and their employees who are able to handle more customers more quickly, especially during peak hours. It is also an option for customers who prefer to make purchases without contacting the store’s staff. Self-service cash registers have become very popular among customers, in particular those who come to the store to pick up a few things only. In the satisfaction survey, users of such self-service cash registers express their satisfaction with the ease and intuitive character of the solution — the NPS survey One app, numerous benefits Each Żappka user receives a personalised offer prepared based on their own shopping history. They are also given the opportunity to collect żapps — points that can be exchanged for selected products, including of the own brand variety, promoting a sustainable lifestyle. Żappka offers also the Żappka Post functionality allowing to monitor the status of and to easily collect any parcels. The process of sending a parcel is simple and convenient. The customer orders the service online, and no labels are required to be printed out. All they have to do is to label the parcel by hand, with the appropriate number generated online, and deliver it to a store of their choice. In 2021, through the app, we conducted the pilot phase of the “Good Package” programme that supports the prevention of food waste in our stores. As far as social engagement is concerned, customers could also use the app to support the initiatives of our choosing. Additionally, the app allows customers shopping at Żabka Nano stores to make purchases in the simplest possible way — by taking products from shelves, without the need to scan and pay at the cash desk. The technology used in the store recognises Żappka users and automatically processes the payment. score for this form of shopping equalled 74 points. The result serves as a basis for future activities promoting this type of service among our customers. In 2021, approximately 10% of them took advantage of our self-service cash registers.