Coop Swiss
Coop Swiss
Submitted by Garry Cronan on October 15, 2007 - 12:31pm. Coop Swiss | Retailing | Switzerland | Products | Principles | Principles/CSRCoop Swiss is the no. 2 retailer in Switzerland with an overall market share of 16.7%. It has over 1500 shops and hypermarkets and has petrol outlets, banks and restaurants.
Global 300 ranking:
13Number of members:
2,316,223Number of employees:
44,916Gender Diversity:
61% of employees are femaleTurnover:
USD $: 2,147,483,647Type of Co-operative:
Consortium and FederationDate founded:
1890Operating Countries:
Switzerland
Website:
Products
Environmentally and socially responsible flagship labels: Coop’s flagship labels Coop Naturaplan, Coop Naturaline, Coop Oecoplan and Max Havelaar are success stories with a history extending back over ten years. With these flagship labels, Coop
has taken environmentally and socially responsible products out of their niches and made them attractive to a broad public.
Fair-trade products: Coop is and will remain the world’s biggest provider of fairtrade products and is constantly adding new items to this range – most recently Max Havelaar avocado and Bio Noisette chocolate.
Textiles: In 1995, Coop launched the sale of organically produced cotton from fair trade under the Naturaline label. “Today, Coop is the world’s largest retailer of organic and fair-trade textiles.” The training centre in the cotton-growing area of Maikaal, India, was financed by the Coop Naturaplan Fund.
ProSpecieRara: The aim of the ProSpecieRara Foundation is to promote the revival of heirloom native plants and prevent threatened breeds of domestic animals from becoming extinct.
Purchasing: In February 2006, Coop and the retailers Colruyt (Belgium), Conad (Italy), E.LECLERC (France) and REWE Group (Germany) established a joint purchasing alliance. The main goals of ‘Coopernic’, as the alliance is called, are to pool the sourcing of internationally tradable goods, eliminate sourcing intermediaries and lower logistics costs with a view to offering customers more affordable and more attractive products.
Animal Welfare: The Swiss animal welfare organization STS performed a broadly based study of animal protection in the Swiss retailing sector, awarding Coop the highest number of points and the accolade of being Swiss champion in animal welfare – a success deriving from years of development work on the Naturaplan flagship label.
Principles
Standards: Seven Naturaline suppliers have already been certified to the highest social standard SA 8000, and others will follow suit in 2006. Many products have certifications such as Swissmill (Products: flours, flour mixtures, semolina, maize, oat flakes, extruder products, durum wheat semolina. Certifications: ISO 9001:2000, ISO 14001, SA 8000. The reporting is based closely on the indicator list of the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI).
CSR Related Awards: In February 2005, Coop was awarded first prize for the best sustainability report by ‘öbu’, the Swiss Association for Ecologically Aware Company Management. In February 2006, the WWF and the ‘Vier Pfoten’ animal welfare organization presented Coop with the Golden Shopping Basket for the best performance in the field of sustainability.
Membership of CSR group: In January 2005, it became a member of the Business Social Compliance Initiative (BSCI), an association of European retailers set up to implement social-accountability standards. In parts of the textile sector, membership of BSCI has the advantage that the code of conduct, which is based on the ‘Clean Clothes Campaign’ in existence since 2000, can be implemented more efficiently and to greater effect.
CSR related research: On the basis of the experience gained with vegetable producers and their suppliers in Southern Spain, Coop has entered into a joint projectrelated partnership with the GTZ (German Society for Technical Innovation) and EurepGAP. The project is entitled GRASP (Good and Risk-oriented Social Practices in Agriculture) and aims to improve social conditions for plantation and seasonal workers in agriculture.
