We recently had the pleasure of speaking with Steve Norris, Director and Co-founder of Get More Vits, about their dedication to sustainability and our exciting new partnership.
In January, we were thrilled to announce Get More Vits as the latest partner to adopt its voluntary micro-contribution initiative in an effort to combat global water scarcity. Get More Vits, the UK’s number one selling Vitamin drink, will be donating for each bottle sold in Co-op stores, with the proceeds funding water programmes across Africa and Asia.
Q1. What are Get More Vits sustainability goals?
So as we have outlined, we are committed to achieving net zero emissions by 2050 which is in line with many other organisations. There’s work to do but we have certainly started on this journey. We are particularly mindful of the raw materials and packaging we use and are constantly looking for improvements. We are using 30% recycled PET in our production and we are on a path to get that up to 100% recycled content. This will mean we can ultimately use less plastic and we are partnering with our manufacturing suppliers to enable this. We also have a range of Get More Vits drinks in aluminium cans as an alternative which are fully recyclable. More broadly, we are a virtual team and we have been since we started as company so we have never used an office. We have adopted a Zoom and Teams format and we believe in making the use of the technology to support our team around the country.
Q2. What programmes are you currently involved in?
On the packaging side, we are reducing the amount of ink in our bottle sleeves. Our previous bottle sleeve was all white while the new version will have nearly half the ink making it much easier to recycle. For some of our European business, we are going to add a tethered cap that connects the cap to the bottle which also aids recycling. We are working with the British Soft Drinks Association as well as our manufacturing partners to ensure we are doing all we can to reduce our impact.
We are working with Ecologi to tackle our carbon footprint. Since joining their initiative in 2021, we have planted over 2,000 trees across 13 countries and we have avoided over 150 tonnes of CO2e through projects that generate renewable energy, capture methane waste, and prevent deforestation.
We are also doing some work with Positive Planet to accelerate our sustainability goals, so we are really looking at sustainability from all angles, bearing in mind the size of our company.
Q3. What prompted Get More Vits to get involved with the Water Unite Campaign?
Co-op was a new customer for us last year and whenever we form a new relationship with a retailer, we want to align ourself with what is important to them. Certainly, when we became introduced to Water Unite, it was a no-brainer for the team!
It’s a very worthwhile cause and a chance to work with the Co-op as a nationwide retailer to support and amplify the mission of Water Unite. We have been involved in a number of other initiatives and working in partnership with retailers is a really powerful way of getting that message through to consumers.
Q4. Do you have a donation target?
It’s as much as we possibly can! It’s a nice fit for us that the Water Unite model is 1p donated per litre as all our products launched in the Co-op are 1 litre so all of our products will make a difference. We hope that the ongoing discussions and the partnerships we have with Water Unite and the Co-op will mean that we can bring that message of positive impact to as many customers as possible.
Getting Water Unite’s message out there is important as once customers know the good they can do from every purchase, this incentivises more purchases, leading to more donations. As a healthy drinks brand, this gives the consumer a double benefit of making a positive impact while being healthy.