Customers

Our network of retail customers

Our products reach shoppers through a network of customers including retailers, wholesalers and distributors. International retail customers such as Walmart, Tesco, Carrefour and Metro predominate in the US and Europe and have a growing presence in developing markets. In 2008 around a fifth of our worldwide sales were channelled through ten major retail chains.

We also sell products through a more diverse group of distributors, wholesalers and small, independent outlets and kiosks, particularly in developing and emerging markets. Meeting the needs of these different types of retail channels will contribute to our growth in these markets.

Our goal is to ensure that Unilever is the partner of choice for our smaller as well as our large international customers. With our expertise, wide-ranging portfolio of products and international network of businesses, we are well placed to work with retail groups in innovative ways to meet shoppers' needs.

Working with customers on sustainability

The past few years have seen many of our large international customers taking a strong stance on sustainability issues, with some ambitious targets in areas such as energy use, greenhouse gas emissions and waste.

The sustainability strategies of global retailers can have significant impacts on their supply chains. We welcome this development as a powerful driver for improving sustainability knowledge and performance across a wide range of companies and sectors.

With our long-standing activities in the area of sustainability, we can not only respond to the growing requirements of customers, but share our expertise and explore opportunities for joint initiatives.

Thus we are increasingly engaging with retailers on sustainability issues, sharing our experience and knowledge in areas such as sustainable agriculture and measuring lifecycle product impacts. We work together to deliver innovative in-store programmes that help educate shoppers.

Europe

Working in close co-operation with the Walmart Group, in the summer of 2008 we set up 'sustainability kitchens' at ASDA superstores around the UK. The objective was to encourage shoppers to make environmentally friendly changes, eg washing laundry at 30°C, that could also save them money. As part of this activity, ASDA ran a promotion on selected Unilever brands with strong vitality credentials such as Hellmann's, Persil and PG Tips, resulting in a significant sales increase during the period.

Latin America

Our brands Knorr, AdeS, Omo and Rexona are working in partnership with one of the biggest retailers in Brazil, Pão de Açúcar, to promote CEMPRE, a packaging recycling scheme for shoppers. Since the launch of this initiative in 2001, 103 recycling stations have been established in 24 cities, working in partnership with 30 waste collection co-operatives to recycle over 26 000 tonnes of packaging.

Asia

We were asked by SM, the largest retailer in the Philippines, to help develop an environmentally focused campaign to change the way shoppers use, reuse and dispose of plastic bags. Together, we established the CARES (Concerned and Responsible Eco-Shoppers) campaign, launching a reusable and recyclable shopping bag – the Green Bag. In one year, the reuse of shopping bags increased threefold.

Continuing our relationship with Walmart

We continue to provide expert support to Walmart's sustainable value networks (SVN). We participate in four of these 13 SVNs which aim to bring Walmart's suppliers together to share best practice. Unilever is taking the lead in water by developing a reliable way to measure how efficiently it suppliers are using water in growing crops. We ran an irrigation study among Californian tomato growers, the results of which will contribute to a sustainability scorecard for Walmart suppliers.

In early 2008 Walmart named Unilever its 2007 Supplier of the Year for Sustainable Engagement.

Working as an industry on sustainability

We support industry programmes that bring together manufacturers and retailers to collectively address sustainability.

• Continuing our relationship with Tesco

Unilever's CEO, Paul Polman, and Sir Terry Leahy, CEO, Tesco have established a joint industry group to develop a 'common business language' and common metrics for packaging in the context of sustainability. This will enable a more efficient dialogue with companies up and down the supply chain on ways to reduce the environmental impact of packaging, while preserving its many important functions.

• The Consumer Goods Forum

We are a founding member of the Consumer Goods Forum, a global association for the world’s leading consumer goods manufacturers and retailers, launched in June 2009. The Forum unites the industry into a single association to ensure it continues to meet the evolving needs of consumers, including sustainability and food safety. Paul Polman is co-chair of the Board Strategy Advisory Committee which focuses on setting the strategic direction for the association’s activities.