Sustainability in retail: making progress with AI, automation and advanced analytics

Carl leads the Retail Industry team for Ricoh USA. He brings more than 30 years of experience helping retailers and brands solve their complex business challenges.

During his career, Carl has successfully partnered with many of the top global retailers and CPG brands to help them better serve their consumers and improve their bottom lines via a wide range of business transformation solutions in all areas of operation.

Nearly half of all global consumers are choosing to buy from brands with a clear commitment to sustainability. But there’s a paradox about sustainability in retail that often goes unspoken: how do retailers balance the desire for growing profits with the need for more meaningful sustainability efforts?

Because the demand for new products will never go away, the risk to the environment never will either. So, what’s a retailer to do?

Thankfully, despite the gravity of the issue, there is a lot to be optimistic about. In fact, 86% of consumer industry CXOs believe that “with immediate action, they can limit the worst impacts of climate change and move toward an improved future.”¹

Here’s a look at ways retail businesses can make the most impact:

How you sell it

Augmented reality

As online purchases continue to increase, so do returns. And with only 50% of returned products going back on the shelf, the rest end up in landfills⁵. So while retailers might be making more eco-friendly products, if they still end up in the dump there’s no real sustainability improvement.

Augmented reality can help reduce the rate of returns by helping online shoppers make better buying decisions. By empowering customers with better ways of buying products, retailers can improve their return rate and reduce the carbon footprint created by moving product back up the supply chain and into the landfill.

Where you sell it

Updating facilities

Retailers can improve energy efficiency and produce fewer emissions from their stores or facilities by using more renewable energy sources such as solar or wind power, LED lighting, and optimizing HVAC systems.

AI can optimize energy consumption by analyzing data on occupancy, temperature, and lighting levels to adjust heating and cooling systems and turning off lights and equipment when not in use.

Summary

With positive pressure from executive leadership, consumers and investors, the retail industry can move the needle on sustainability.

The retailers that get it right will focus on making changes to what they sell, how they sell it, and where they sell it.

Is improving sustainability on your radar?

Ricoh’s passion and commitment to environmental sustainability and corporate responsibility combined with numerous awards, sustainable products and services, and a team of innovative experts, means you’re in good hands.

This Earth Day let’s make a difference together.