Greenpeace Gives U.S. Retailers a Failing Grade

The Greenpeace report Packaging Away the Planet ranks 20 of the largest U.S. grocery retailers for the first time on their efforts to eliminate single-use plastics. 

The assessment found that, across the board, U.S. supermarkets are failing to adequately address the plastic pollution crisis they are contributing to. Aldi, Kroger and Albertsons scored the highest in this year’s assessment, while Meijer, Wakefern and H-E-B were the worst. 

Greenpeace evaluated retailers on their policies, plastic reduction efforts, innovation and initiatives, and transparency. Aldi scored the highest of all retailers because it has a plastic reduction target, a more comprehensive reduction plan, greater transparency and a commitment to implement refill and reuse systems. Kroger was the only top-five retailer to commit to ban single-use plastic checkout bags and has joined Loop—a new refill and reuse initiative—but the company has not yet released a comprehensive plastics reduction plan.  

Greenpeace’s report utilized a combination of publicly available information and survey responses to formulate the retailers’ scores. None of the supermarkets scored above 35 out of 100 this year. This year’s report will serve as a baseline for what Greenpeace expects will be significant reforms in the near future. 

Check out the complete report here.