HelloFresh Sustainability Report 2020
As the world’s largest meal kit provider, HelloFresh offers their customers a safe, convenient way to source fresh ingredients. With the rapid growth of the company due to the global pandemic and lockdowns came an even bigger responsibility to maintain high sustainability standards while efficiently reacting to such dynamic conditions. Their 2020 sustainability report highlights their efforts taken to strengthen the company’s supply chain and further reduce both carbon emissions and food waste.
HelloFresh offset 100% of their direct carbon emissions caused by internal operations, offices, and deliveries — making them the first global carbon-neutral meal kit company.
The company has set two ambitious goals from 2019 to 2022: to lower their production facilities’ carbon emissions by 60% per euro of revenue and reduce food waste at their facilities by 50% per euro of revenue each year.
HelloFresh’s innovative supply chain is a lean process that eliminates food waste, favors local ingredient sourcing, and reduces carbon emissions.
Sourcing ingredients locally allows them to reduce transport time and their carbon footprint, and to plan routes more efficiently.
Food waste accounts for between 8% and 11% of global greenhouse gas emissions. HelloFresh considers the surplus of food generated and donated 73% of their total unsold food in 2020.
Where possible at their distribution centers, HelloFresh returns surplus food back into inventory, allows employees to take surplus home, and rescues edible food and redirects it to feed people in their communities.
The company installs solar photovoltaic panels at their distribution centers and uses their own generated electricity wherever possible — at the same time sourcing renewable electricity (such as hydropower and wind energy).
During 2020, emissions at HelloFresh’s production facilities decreased from 9.3 to 4.1 grams per euro of revenue.
HelloFresh US launched an offset program in April 2020 in collaboration with TerraPass to purchase more than 50,000 metric tons of carbon to offset through local projects, and to source over 20,000 MWh of renewable energy.
In 2020, 10% of the energy the company consumed came from renewable sources, compared to 1% in 2019.
Through more efficient route planning and an increase in shared emission-free routes, HelloFresh achieved significant reductions of carbon emissions in 2020. They are also working closely with external logistics providers to further introduce efficiency optimization and, where possible, use electric vehicles.
In 2020, the company increased the number of vegetarian and vegan recipes on their menus to help combat food production as a significant cause of global warming.
HelloFresh made significant progress in 2020 with packaging innovations, including: improved plastics to be thinner and softer, eliminating packaging for certain ingredients, switching to fully paper-based packaging for grains and rice, and innovating to ensure protein is fresh, safe, and sustainably packed protein.
In 2019, the company launched their first in-house production of water-based ice packs to avoid the microplastics required for gel-filled cool packs.
100%
of direct carbon emissions offset
10%
of operational energy comes from renewable sources
Our mission is to change the way people eat forever — and the world has never needed new ways to enjoy fresh homemade meals more than it does today.
Thomas Griese
CEO International and Co-Founder, HelloFresh
HelloFresh aims to change the way people eat, forever. By helping to eliminate food and energy waste seen in the traditional grocery and shopping experiences, they consider themselves a pioneer of supply chain efficiency and sustainability. The company has made by becoming the first global carbon-neutral meal kit company, but this is only the beginning: HelloFresh has set and publicized inaugural 2022 targets to reduce production facilities CO2 emissions per euro of revenue and reduce food waste to landfill or incineration per euro of revenue.
2.2 g
of food waste per meal at production operations
73%
of total unsold food donated in 2020
To us, one thing is clear – in a rapidly expanding category like the meal kit space, high standards are required in order to mitigate any environmental impact. As the global leader in the meal kit industry, we take our responsibility for setting a clear precedent very seriously.
Thomas Griese
CEO International and Co-Founder, HelloFresh
A Momentum, LLC Company
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