Sustainable Business and Circular Economy: The Case of Mercadona

This essay provides an overview of sustainable business practices, focusing on how businesses can protect the environment, conserve resources, and ensure social equity while maintaining profitability. It examines Mercadona, a supermarket chain, as a case study, detailing its implementation of a circular economy model and its engagement with various stakeholders, including customers, suppliers, employees, society, and capital. The analysis highlights Mercadona's efforts in logistics optimization, energy savings, waste management, and reduction of CO2 emissions, showcasing its commitment to environmental protection and sustainable growth. The essay concludes that Mercadona effectively contributes to sustainable business by adopting strategies that ensure long-term profitability while benefiting the environment and society.

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Sustainable Business
Student’s Name
3/28/2019

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Introduction
The term sustainable businesses refer to the business organizations that protect the
environment and conserve natural resources. It adopts the strategies that provide social equity
and ensures the well-being of the employees. It focuses on providing long term profitability
and growth (Joyce & Paquin, 2016).
Part A
Sustainable businesses manage the economy by satisfying the present needs of the
consumers and society without compromising the ability of future generations. It focuses on
developing environment-friendly products and satisfies the needs of the community. It
manages the economy by meeting the triple bottom line. Sustainable business deals with its
stakeholders by involving them and developing the products that satisfy their needs. The
business caters to the needs of the employees, investors, suppliers, customers, and capital and
satisfies the needs of each stakeholder. It develops the strategy considering the needs of all
the stakeholders to make the business more sustainable. These businesses focus and
encourage the other companies to support the environment by developing reusable products,
using local sourcing and reducing wastage and efficiently using natural resources. Sustainable
business leaves a positive impact on the environment (Mandojana & Bansal, 2016).
Part B
Mercadona is the supermarket chain that was established in the year 1977 by Carnicas
Roig Group. It is a family company and manages the economy by applying the circular
economy model and has the vision to satisfy the needs of the ultimate Boss. The company
focuses on satisfying the needs of its clients and effectively contributes towards the society,

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community, and stakeholders. It has focused on responding to the environment and has been
transitioned in a circular economy model. The company effectively cooperates with the
manufacturers and the suppliers to contribute towards the sustainable growth of the business
and ensuring long term profitability of the business (Mercadona, 2017).
The company seeks to satisfy the needs of its five stakeholders which include
customers, suppliers, employees, society, and capital. It satisfies the customers by providing
the best quality product at the cheapest prices in comparison to its competitors. It builds trust
with limited suppliers by adopting the model of virtual integration. It provides permanent
jobs to its employees and provides appropriate training and incentives to satisfy its
employees. It is analyzed that the company has substantially contributed towards society and
capital. It focuses on providing maximum satisfaction to its boss. It ensures well-being on the
employees by applying fair trade practices (Nunez-Cacho et al, 2018).
The company applies the new efficient store model and has responded to the
environment covering the three stages: logistics optimization, energy savings, and waste
management. It focuses on shortening the logistics chain and providing the fresh quality
product which is sourced locally. The company has adopted European and national strategies
to combat climatic change and has applied energy efficient measures. The company is able to
reduce the environmental footprint by 40 % in comparison to the convention store model.
The company has made an investment of about 52 million euros towards protection of the
environment and 37000 tonnes reduction in CO2 emission. It effectively contributes towards
the protection of the animals (Mandojana & Bansal, 2016).
Conclusion
From the above discussion, it is concluded that Mercadona effectively contributes
towards sustainable business and protects the environment and the society through the

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adoption of the best possible strategies. The company is able to sustain its competitive
advantages and ensures long term profitability and growth.

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References
Joyce, A., & Paquin, R. L. (2016). The triple layered business model canvas: A tool to design
more sustainable business models. Journal of Cleaner Production, 135, 1474-1486
Mercadona. (2017). Mercadona environmental report. Retrieved from:
https://info.mercadona.es/en/current-affairs/mercadona-presents-its-new-
environmental-report/news
Nunez-Cacho, P., Molina-Moreno, V., Corpas-Iglesias, F., & Cortes-Garcia, F. (2018).
Family businesses transitioning to a circular economy model: The case of
“Mercadona”. Sustainability, 10(2), 538
Ortiz‐de‐Mandojana, N., & Bansal, P. (2016). The long‐term benefits of organizational
resilience through sustainable business practices. Strategic Management
Journal, 37(8), 1615-1631