The project will form a key part of an upcoming World Green Building Council global campaign on healthy buildings -- which will cover a range of building types beyond retail, and follows last year’s well --received report "Health, Wellbeing and Productivity in Offices."
The Retail Task Group, led by UK-GBC, will be international in scope, ensuring the outputs are relevant for the retail sector globally.
Retailers, as well as those who invest in, develop and manage retail property, are increasingly keen to understand the relationship between sustainable store design, the health and wellbeing of staff and customers, and profit.
The Retail Task Group will seek to adapt existing ways of measuring health and wellbeing set out in last year’s report specifically for the retail sector, to help strengthen the business case for sustainable stores, and pilot the metrics in real stores - gathering real data and developing best practice case studies.
“Green buildings must not only meet our planetary needs, but also the needs of people and business," said John Alker, director of policy and communications and Interim CEO at the UK Green Building Council. "That’s why health, wellbeing and productivity in the property sector is such a key topic – it’s essential for making the business case for green buildings. But it’s now time to go from awareness raising to action, and driving real change on the ground.”
Among those who have signed on as sponsors of the effort is Marks and Spencer, whose Plan A Projcct Manager, Zoe Young, said, “Collaborating with the WorldGBC and UK-GBC on developing retail specific metrics will enable us to further establish the business case for sustainable stores. In support of our Plan A objectives, we want to understand if, in addition to being more resource efficient, sustainable shops can attract more revenue.”
Other sponsors include ARUP, Land Securities, Skanska and Saint-Gobain.
The Retail Task Group will publish its interim results in mid-2015 and the first schedule of work will be completed by early 2016.
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