Marks & Spencer to sell loose fruit and vegetables to reduce single-use plastic
MARKS & Spencer is to sell loose fruit and veg free of all plastic packaging.
The trial will also see greengrocers advising customers on how best to preserve fresh produce.
Hard fruit and veg such as potatoes are among more than 90 lines to be trialled at the Tolworth store in South West London.
Soft fruits and berries will be sold in compostable punnets. And M&S has removed best before date labels as part of the experiment ahead of a wider rollout.
The chain also pledged to replace plastic produce bags with paper ones, and phase out plastic barcode stickers at all its shops.
Louise Nicholls, head of food sustainability at M&S, said: “The traditional greengrocer will play a key part in educating our customers.
“Our plan is to create long-term impact using insights from this trial.” The plastic-free displays will resemble the grocer run by Arkwright — and played by Ronnie Barker — on TV sitcom Open All Hours.
M&S says its approach will save 580 tons of waste over two years.
The chain has already phased out 75million pieces of plastic cutlery given out in its stores each year. It has also replaced two million straws with paper ones.
Early last year M&S attracted criticism for selling plastic-wrapped slices of cauliflower, labelled cauliflower “steak”, for £2 each.
Details of the trial were revealed after the chain announced the locations of 17 more store closures.
Last year Morrisons brought back brown paper bags for loose fruit and veg, which it said would prevent 150million small plastic bags from being used every year.
Iceland also carried out a trial to see if its shoppers would pay 10p for a paper bag as an alternative to single-use plastic bags.
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