American Retailers Take Sustainable Steps, Part 1

Kohl’s released their first corporate sustainability report last week. As we were reviewing the press release, we began to wonder what the other major American department stores are doing to amend their wasteful ways. After looking at the top six retailers, there are some who are taking real steps towards building sustainability into their operations and others who haven’t even begun the process.

In part one, we’ll look at Kohl’s, JCPenny and Macy’s. Let’s see where these three retailers stand…

kohl’s: the green leader of american department stores

Using Newsweek’s 2010 Green Rankings as the yard stick, Kohl’s is America’s greenest department store. They come in at number 40 on the list of the 500 largest publicly traded companies in America, as measured by revenue, market capitalization, and number of employees. This week, Kohl’s released their first ever annual corporate sustainability responsibility report.

The company has been working on improving its sustainability efforts for some time. ”Kohl’s associates and suppliers have long made sustainability – particularly energy efficiency and waste reduction – part of their business practices,” said Ken Bonning, Kohl’s executive vice president of store planning and logistics in the company’s press release. Last year, Kohl’s set five goals surrounding the company’s five primary environmental strategies: energy efficiency, waste reduction, green building design and operation, emission reduction, and stakeholder engagement. And they’ve made progress on all fronts.

Of their many accomplishments, we think it’s worth pointing out a few highlights:

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