The Grocery Stewardship Certification (GSC) announced today that Pennsylvania-based Weis Markets, Inc. has enrolled all of its 165 stores in the sustainability program.
The GSC is the nation’s only grocery sustainability certification program and recognizes stores for reducing energy consumption, water use, food waste and other related measures. GSC program staff also work with stores to review and improve their sustainability after the initial assessment.
A pilot version of the project was launched in late 2012 with Maine-based Hannaford Supermarkets and the program was opened up to all companies late last year.
“Weis is clearly committed to reducing their environmental footprint and making stores as sustainable as possible,” said GSC Program Manager Peter Cooke. “The industry needs leaders like this to demonstrate that sustainability is good for the environment and good for the bottom line.”
Weis Markets operates grocery stores in Pennsylvania, Maryland, New York, New Jersey and West Virginia. The first 40 Weis Market stores will be assessed by the end of March.
“Partnering with Manomet in the GSC program helps us keep our momentum on sustainability growing,” said John Lerch, Director of Energy and Facility Maintenance at Weis Markets. “The GSC program provides the framework for capturing the sustainability practices at each store and the verification assessments will authenticate the efforts made by Weis. The relationship with the GSC is extremely important in closing the loop and making our sustainability efforts authentic to our customers.”
Weis is proud to support the community through various programs and to support local growers by being one of the largest local purchasers in Pennsylvania. To learn more about Weis Markets please visit www.weismarkets.com.
The Manomet Center for Conservation Sciences has created collaborative environmental and sustainability solutions for more than 40 years. In 2012, the Manomet Center launched the GSC to help supermarkets become more sustainable. To learn more about Manomet please visitwww.manomet.org. To read more about the GSC visit www.grocerycert.org.