Sustainable Development Goals

HelloFresh Announces Sustainability Progress and Commits to Ambitious Targets

Mar 17, 2021 10:00 AM ET
  • Strong progress in 2020: carbon emissions at production facilities decreased from 9.3 to 4.1 grams per euro revenue; remaining emissions were successfully offset
  • Food waste in operations reduced by a third on a per euro revenue basis; 73% of excess food was donated to charitable organizations
  • First-time sustainability targets announced; targets will significantly impact reduction of carbon emissions and food waste
  • HelloFresh became first global carbon-neutral meal kit company

NEW YORK and BERLIN, March 17 2021 /3BL Media/ – HelloFresh, the world’s leading meal kit provider, today announced that it has exceeded its sustainability plans for 2020 and will further expand its efforts for 2021 and beyond. The recently published Sustainability Report 2020 highlights key achievements, in line with the “Sustainable Development Goals” defined by the United Nations.

“In 2020, we offered our customers a safe, convenient way to source fresh ingredients when they needed it most.  Our responsibility for our planet and our people has significantly increased with the size of our company, which is why we’ve continued to radically focus our efforts on progressing our sustainability agenda over the past year,” says Thomas Griesel co-founder of HelloFresh.

Carbon reduction strategy shows initial success

Key initiatives from 2020 included launching HelloFresh’s carbon reduction strategy. This also included offsetting 100% of direct carbon emissions from internal operations and offices, delivery to customers and corporate travel. HelloFresh has since become the first global carbon-neutral meal kit company and will continue to offset emissions over the course of 2021.

Initial reduction initiatives resulted in emissions at HelloFresh’s production facilities* decreasing from 9.3 to 4.1 grams per euro revenue. This was driven by improved operational efficiency as well as replacing conventional energy sources with renewable energy and investments in solar photovoltaic installations in HelloFresh’s production facilities. Our Dallas-Fort Worth distribution center switched all electricity sources to wind energy in November 2020, following our New Jersey-based Green Chef facility in June. HelloFresh US has secured wind energy contracts for two other facilities beginning this year. All of these initiatives will also continue to pay into the goal of reducing emissions in production facilities by 60% per euro revenue by 2022.

In 2020, HelloFresh’s total carbon emissions across scopes 1,2 and 3 amounted to 96,310 metric tons of CO2.

Ongoing efforts to reduce food waste

HelloFresh’s lean, make-to-order business model inherently reduces food waste. The company is further strengthening its ambitions by aiming to halve food waste to landfill or incineration per euro revenue by 2022. From 2019 to 2020 HelloFresh already succeeded in reducing the amount of food waste from 0.6 to 0.4 grams per euro revenue. Out of the nearly 5,000 metric tons of surplus food from the company’s operations, 73% was donated to various organizations and communities across our local markets. Further efforts to reduce food waste include managing supply chain efficiencies, continuous improvement of packaging solutions as well as ongoing collaborations with research partners.

HelloFresh US is participating in the expert network of ReFED, a multi-stakeholder non-profit committed to reducing food waste in the United States through a data-driven approach. The ReFED Expert Network consists of over 75 sustainability experts. ReFED has revolutionized the way the industry looks at food waste and identified a number of actionable solutions in its “Roadmap to Reduce U.S. Food Waste” and Insights Engine.

Ambitious targets set for 2022

For the first time, HelloFresh has set itself tangible, group wide environmental targets for two of the most pressing global issues:

  1. Reducing production facilities CO2 emissions per euro revenue by 60 % by 2022
  2. Reducing food waste to landfill or incineration per euro revenue by 50 % by 2022

The baseline for both targets is 2019.

“We started sustainability reporting in 2017 and have seen significant, measurable positive impacts on the environment and our business alike,” said Jeff Yorzyk, Director of Sustainability, HelloFresh US. “Companies that take sustainability efforts seriously, engage meaningfully and take action tend to see more robust results for their organization. It’s good for business, better for our planet, and for HelloFresh, it helps us focus on our mission to change the way people eat – forever.”

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About HelloFresh

HelloFresh SE is the world’s leading meal-kit company and operates in the U.S., the United Kingdom, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Australia, Austria, Switzerland, Canada, New Zealand, Sweden, France and Denmark. In 2020, HelloFresh delivered over 600 million meals and reached close to 5.3 million active customers. HelloFresh was founded in Berlin in November 2011 and went public on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange in November 2017. HelloFresh has offices in New York, Berlin, London, Amsterdam, Sydney, Toronto, Auckland, Paris and Copenhagen.

*Includes: distribution centers, excluding logistics hubs