Delhaize under fire for plastic waste generated by new giveaway

Delhaize came under fire at the weekend for its new giveaways and saving stamp cards, which offer pieces of Lego-like building blocks to kids to build their own Delhaize store. Consumers took the supermarket to task all over social media for the amount of plastic involved in the packaging.

Shoppers can earn stamps to fill up a card that allows them to buy pieces of the toy supermarket, such as the Starter Packet, a delivery truck and 50 building blocks. Every shopper, however, gets a free building block with purchase, and these packages are what angered those who took to social media.

A plastic wrapper contains a plastic tray that in turn contains one tiny building block. “Impressive contribution by Delhaize to the mountain of waste,” wrote one Twitter user. “Massive distribution of plastic bags containing a plastic plate with one 1 Lego cube.”

Bad timing, or what?

Other customers noted that the supermarket could not have picked a worse time to launch a campaign for plastic playthings, considering the climate marches of late. The storm of controversy was so intense that the supermarket issued an apology.

“We admit that we made an error with this action, and we apologise,” said Delhaize spokesperson Roel Dekelver this morning on Radio 1. Because the plastic packs have already been made, the supermarket sees little reason to cancel the campaign but is placing containers in their supermarkets for shoppers who want to leave the packaging of their plastic bricks behind.

“We are also contacting organisations to further explore how we can work together to decrease plastic waste in Belgium,” said Dekelver. “And we are taking measure in the next few weeks and months to reduce plastic waste in the supermarkets themselves.”

Photo: Ezra Dessers/Twitter