Our Circularity Design Principles are a set of guidelines that help our commercial teams create ‘circular products’. Some of the principles include: Renewable and Recycled Materials, Durability and Product Disassembly.
Our home the Planet, provides the resources we use to create our products and we are committed to mitigating our environmental impacts in our operations and along supply chains.
To reach our goal of being net zero by 2040, we focus on being efficient in the stores and sites that we operate, work with our logistics providers to trial new fuels and electric options, and are moving from a linear to a circular mindset along the product lifecycle.
Stores and sites
Focusing on being efficient in the stores and sites that we operate to save resources and cost.
- Engaging colleagues to promote energy efficiency behaviours
- Replacing gas-fired heating and refrigerants with lower carbon alternatives
- Installing photovoltaic panels across store estate and sites
- Trialing lower-impact transit packaging
- Improving product packaging and e-commerce packaging to reduce damages and returns
- Introducing drop testing at our DCs to further improve packaging durability
- Advocate for electricity grid decarbonisation via the Aldersgate Group and British Retail Consortium
Transport and distribution
Working with logistics providers to trial new fuels and electric options where infrastructure allows.
- Electric-/hybrid-only company car options
- Ongoing driver training to improve efficiency
- E-commerce delivery efficiency programme
- Expand our use of bio-compressed natural gas (BIO-CNG) in home delivery (HDN) fleet
- Trialing first-to-market electric vehicles with logistics partners
- Advocating for low-emissions solutions across fleets and shipping via Sustainable Logistics Forum
Product circularity
Moving from a linear to a circular mindset for product design, raw material sourcing, use-in-home, longevity and disposal.
- Increase use of lower-impact raw materials
- Extending products in the Conscious Choice range
- Using Cascale's Higg Index set of tools to engage suppliers and monitor performance
- Prolonging product life through product care, repair and upcycling tips
- Designing products ready for a circular economy
- Extend take-back services to cover more product categories
- Using recycled fibre from take-back service in Remade product ranges
- Implement services that further develop circular behaviours such as repair
- Through the UK Textiles PACT, run by WRAP, we are collaborating on textile longevity innovation
- Better Cotton member
- Candidate member of Cascale (previously Sustainable Apparel Coalition)
How Dunelm’s circularity strategy interacts with our products along its lifecycle
Our latest modelling indicates that raw materials used in our products account for a significant proportion of our carbon footprint. Sourcing in accordance with our ‘More Responsibly Sourced’ policies and increasing the percentage of materials like recycled cotton and recycled polyester in our products, reduces the energy and water used to grow, extract or cultivate virgin raw materials used in our products.
A significant proportion of our carbon emissions come from the manufacturing of our products. Our Better Manufacturing programme supports our suppliers to reduce carbon and water impacts associated with the manufacturing of our products. Using tools such as the Higg Index, our Tier 1 suppliers are disclosing environmental impact data across energy, water, chemicals and waste.
Across our Home Delivery Network we are transitioning to lowercarbon fuels such as BIO-CNG, which have 85% less emissions than fossil fuel diesel. We also aim to use sea freight rather than air freight to limit our carbon footprint.
In FY24, we expanded our paints and craft ranges and our range of knobs and knockers to encourage upcycling of product. We also want to encourage customers to repair their products and in FY24, we ran in-store repair pilots in three stores with workshops, repair cafes and live upcycling demonstrations.
Keeping products and materials in use for as long as possible is central to the transition to a circular economy. We promote reuse and credible recycling and takeback services. We offer customer takeback services for 62% of our range. To help keep products in use that are difficult to recycle, our Home to Home scheme gives customers the opportunity to pass on pre-loved homewares, such as home décor and cookware to find a new home in local communities.
While we want to avoid any products from reaching their end-of-life, they are sometimes not suitable for reuse and in some cases are not recyclable either because of their materials and the current infrastructure or because of their condition and quality.
Planet metrics
| Metric | Target |
| Scope 1 CO2e | 50% reduction by 2030 |
| Scope 1 CO2e/£ Group revenue | 59.3% reduction by FY26 |
| Scope 3 CO2e | 50% reduction by 2030 |
| Virgin plastic packaging used for own-brand products by weight/£ sales | 30% reduction by FY25 |
| Aggregate water footprint in own-brand textiles | 30% reduction by 2030 |
| 'More Responsibly Sourced' cotton in own-brand range | 100% by FY25 |
| 'More Responsibly Sourced' timber in own-brand range | 50% by FY25 |
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