Greggs announced the launch of its first Eco Drive-Thru, part of its priority to become more sustainable with new projects. Located at Easton Lane, Winchester, the drive-thru will test new, green features such as:

• Sun tubes to direct sunlight from the roof into the store, to reduce artificial lighting
• Smart lighting systems, including low-energy fittings and daylight harvesting technology
• Solar panels, powering all in-store digital signage throughout the year
• A rainwater harvesting unit to cut water usage
• Smart heating, cooling and energy recovery systems, including heat pump air conditioning and heat recovery from refrigeration

“This shop builds on our ethos of ‘doing good’, trialling new sustainable in-store initiatives to reduce the environmental impact of our shop operations, with successful features to be rolled out to more of our shops,” the bakery announced.

Although the first of its kind as a drive-thru, this marks the bakery’s second Eco-Shop, following the opening in Northampton in 2022. “Since then, we’ve exceeded our Greggs Pledge target by rolling out features to a quarter of our estate a full year ahead of schedule. Now, over 700 shops incorporate Eco-Shop elements,” Greggs highlights.

Tony Rowson, Property Director, commented on the opening of the new shop: “We’re so excited to have launched our first-ever Eco Drive-Thru. As a leader in our sector, we take our responsibility to do right by the planet and the 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.”

Photo: Greggs