Case Studies

Kingfisher is Europe’s largest home improvement retail group and the third largest in the world, with 1,025 stores in eight countries in Europe and Asia, and sales of over $17 billion. In October 2012, Kingfisher announced a new corporate social responsibility plan call “Kingfisher Net Positive.” This plan outlines a strategy to be net positive and go beyond zero impact to create positive change. Net Positive was launched “with an ambition to contribute positively to some of the big challenges facing the world, while creating a more valuable and sustainable business for our stakeholders”. According to Kingfisher, “We cannot deliver on our core purpose of helping people make better homes without Net Positive”.

Kingfisher is transforming the way it operates to become Net Positive by 2050. To achieve this objective Kingfisher has set targets across the business until 2020 and focuses on four priority areas: timber, energy, innovation and communities. To enable Kingfisher to track progress against their 2020 targets, they will collect data to establish baselines until 2014.

Each of Kingfisher’s priority areas is tightly linked with business goals and achieving each target will create measurable business benefits. Achieving Net Positive will enable Kingfisher to secure crucial resources, unlock new opportunities and drive growth. Kingfisher’s approach to energy will enable the company to tap into a fast-emerging $36.5 Billion European market for in-home energy efficiency. As well, Kingfisher’s community programme will connect the company to hundreds of thousands of new potential customers equipped with the DIY skills, and achieving their timber targets could help Kingfisher save $97 Million by 2020.

Net Positive is fundamental to the future of Kingfisher, as the company believes the businesses that will succeed in the future are those that today show leadership on the sustainability challenges facing the world.