Committed to preventing the disposal of products and components
The value chain's sustainable development strategy leader, Céline Crouzat's testimonial.
Decathlon is undertaking comprehensive measures throughout its value chain to avoid overstocking and the disposal of products or components. This approach, both frugal and innovative, is applied at the design stage along with every stage of the product's life cycle.
To speed up its efforts in this direction, Decathlon committed itself in 2020 to:
🔥 not dispose of, landfill or burn any of our products or components, whether saleable or usable, from 1st July 2021;
🗑 not incinerate or landfill any components or finished products by 2026.
What's essential to remember in 2021
prevention of 1.6 million products being disposed of through the "Save the Frogs" project (for a value of approximately €8 million).
(Although the project has an environmental aim, it is not related to the protection of amphibians. This name comes from in-house at the time of the project was launched.
496 tonnes of products saved
from disposal by the Quality team.
Stop product disposal and add value to surplus goods
What solutions are there to prevent the disposal of products? There is the "Save the Stocks" approach
The "Save the Stocks" project team is committed, since 2015, to making the disposal of products possible by putting in place a method, making it possible to strive for the correct sales requirement as early as the product's design phase, as well as solutions, to clear 100% of any remaining overstock. Decathlon's priority is to first add value to these stocks by using its traditional sales channels. And afterwards, we suggest to teams solutions such as stock clear outs, selling to others, donating (if the sale is impossible), and lastly, recycling.
Progress made in 2021
On 1st July 2021, the commitment made by the entire Decathlon management and its in-house ecosystems to no longer dispose of, landfill or burn any of our saleable or usable products or components came into effect internally.
Decathlon launched, in December 2021, the "Save the Stocks" platform, addressing the need to make this overstock visible, desirable and accessible.This in-house catalogue allows us to identify and access all surplus A and B-grade finished products at competitive prices.It approximately aggregates €14.3 million in overstock at the end of 2021. The aim is to expand this catalogue to include components from 2022 and give access to the platform to other companies to achieve zero disposal collectively. Several advances were also made this year on the various solutions proposed to prevent the disposal of overstock, non-compliant products and components.
1 - Traditional sales
Shifting implantations dates: to avoid the disposal of products, the Signature Sports Brands marshalled their efforts to shift the implantation of some new models and colours.For example, the 2020 colours were maintained in the department right until stocks ran out before putting on display the new spring-summer collection 2021.It is the simplest solution for the company to prevent overstock and product disposal;
Carried out a test on B-grade products: these products represent 3 to 5% of manufactured products, with only visual defects;until now they were systematically disposed of. To avoid this from happening, the "Save the Stocks" teams tested, in 2021, the sale of several of these products (fins with a colour issue, golf practice nets or tents with split open transport bags, etc.) in shops. The B-grade products were then stocked in their original department close to similar models in a marked-out area. This first test's objective was to identify all potential hurdles to the sale of these products to find long-lasting solutions and roll out a system that saves all B-grade products.
2 - Sale to other parties - clear out stock externally
Partnership with Noz21 launched: Decathlon and Europe's discount clearance leader signed an initial partnership, allowing Noz to buy sports goods batches directly from manufacturing countries.
In 2021, Noz bought its first batches in France, Vietnam and India. This partnership in France helped us save, for example, 23,000 items that had been stocked for several years in our warehouses, providing them with a new lease of life. Decathlon's goal is to now develop this type of partnership all around the world. All the solutions put in place by the company helped to prevent the disposal of more than 1.6 million products totalling approximately 8 million Euros in 2021.
Céline crouzat's interview
Value chain's sustainable development strategy leader.
“2021 is a year that will go down in history. We changed the rules of the game by getting Decathlon's management to officially sign up. It will not be easy to change habits; There will, of course, have to be an adjustment period before achieving our goal.But the foundations are now laid, and teammates are motivated and delighted by this decision. We are now going to do everything we can to ensure this process can be made simple and becomes self-evident for all as we strive to achieve zero disposal. Along with officialising this process, the issues linked to the “Save the Stocks” project are integrated into Decathlon's corporate governance top topics; it represent a huge step forward, enabling up to accelerate the trajectory we have set ourselves."
The kimjaly example: designing yoga items
from surplus stock
For several years, Kimjaly has made every effort not to dispose of any of its components.The Decathlon brand has, for example, designed a new yoga shirt from a stock of trouser belt components and a meditation shawl from the components initially intended for the design of a yoga blanket.
Phase-out the disposal of and add value to non-compliant products
A non-compliant product is a product with a defect either linked to its use, regulatory compliance, appearance or safety aspect. When products are identified as non-compliant, they are subject to Quality Control Corrective Measures.
To keep product disposal to a minimum, the Quality team, in 2021, looked at new ways to save non-compliant products. The products progressively follow a process of elimination of solutions: the teams first try to repair them to put them on sale in the traditional retail channel; if this is not possible, they are then donated or recycled.Finally, if no solution can be found, non-compliant products are disposed of as a last resort.
The breakdown of sports goods concerned by this approach is as follows: :
91.7 % repaired;
1.6 % recycled;
1 % donated;
5.7 % returned to suppliers and disposed of.
496 tonnes of products were saved in 2021 from being disposed of by the Quality Department (compared to 347 tonnes in 2020).
