Food-to-go retailer Greggs has launched its first ever ‘eco’ drive-thru store – a ‘shop of the future’ concept fitted with a range of new features aimed at reducing environmental impact.
Greggs has designed this shop of the future with reducing waste, using less water, and lowering energy usage at the core of operational requirements.
The new site is located at Easton Lane, Winchester, and it is the second Greggs ‘eco’ store format in the UK that tests new features viewed as more sustainable than what it deployed before. Materials used for elements of the build and in-shop operational initiatives have been selected with lower environmental impact in mind.
What features can be found in the Winchester shop of the future?
- Sun tubes to direct sunlight from the roof, into the store to reduce need for artificial lighting
- Low energy light fittings and daylight harvesting technology, with a wireless control system which adapts to lighting in real time through smart sensor nodes
- Solar panels to power all of its in store digital signage throughout the year
- Rainwater harvesting unit which has capacity of 3,000 litres, expected to reduce water usage by around 13%
- Heat pump air conditioning and overdoor heater systems which work in conjunction to balance air temperature, as well as a heat recovery system which utilises warm air from refrigeration extraction to warm the air, and a heat pump system that uses surrounding air to warm water.
Greggs launched its first ever eco shop in Northampton in 2022, but this did not have drive-thru facilities. At this site, the retailer trialled knee-operated sinks, under-counter water heaters, energy efficient ovens and more sustainable refrigerant gas. The latest concept store uses new technologies not deployed in Northampton, which highlights the pace of innovation in the clean power market.
In its sustainability report – The Greggs Pledge – Greggs had established a target for more than a quarter of its shops to feature eco shop elements by the end of 2025. However, the company said it exceeded this target a year early, with more than 700 shops (27% of its estate) encompassing elements from the Northampton concept shop by the end of last year.
Tony Rowson, property director at Greggs, commented: “As a leader in our sector, we take our responsibility to do right by the planet and communities we operate in seriously, and we do all that we can to make changes for the better.
“I’m proud of what we’ve achieved with our first eco shop, our shop of the future, which means we can now test further materials and initiatives in this new unit, bringing us another step closer to reaching our net zero carbon objective.”
[image credits: Greggs]
