Lidl is trialling on-shelf smart refill stations for laundry detergent, reducing plastic and saving customers around 20p per purchase.
The trial, which is the first of its kind in the UK, is running across two stores. It will allow customers to use ‘smart’ pouches to purchase detergent from the on-shelf smart refill machine, saving 59g of plastic per refill, the weight of an equivalent single-use plastic bottle.
The machine’s automated, touchscreen experience also offers value for money, saving customers around 20p per refill, when compared to Lidl’s Formil single-use product.
Located on-shelf in the store’s laundry detergent section, the refill stations will increase store capacity by up to 300%, as they use the space of 66 single-use detergent bottles but can fill more than 245 individual pouches.
Algramo’s smart technology will help Lidl record how many times each pouch is refilled and how much packaging has been saved through the trial, while a ‘closed-fill’ system allows customers to fill the pouches with the cap still on, enabling faster, mess-free filling.
Lidl CSR manager Mark Newbold said: “We are incredibly proud of this latest innovation, which will enable our customers to save money and reduce their plastic consumption. We were the first UK supermarket to introduce smart laundry detergent refill stations and now we’re the first to introduce this next generation design.
“It’s our strong belief that good quality and value should go together. We are committed to providing our customers with cost saving solutions that can help their wallets and the planet.”
Lidl has already run an initial six-month pilot of a larger, freestanding refill machine. Some 97% of customers who used it said they would recommend it to a friend or colleague, while 88% planned to use it again.
