Progressive Budgens retailer Andrew Thornton has launched an initiative to show businesses how to put people and planet first “and trust that profit will follow”.
Thornton, who repositioned his Belsize Park Budgens store as a ‘community supermarket that really cares’ (and stocked it with local and organic products and the latest eco technologies) says many businesses have become “profit obsessed”.
His Heart in Business initiative aims to encourage companies to take a more people and planet-focused approach to doing business.
Thornton told HuffPost UK Lifestyle: “The philosophy behind Heart in Business is a flip from the current corporate mindset which seems to place corporate profit above everything else. You have a much more engaged group of people working in the business if you care for people and the environment – the people who work for you will be far more fulfilled and passionate”.
Since implementing the scheme his own businesses employee performance has improved and the store consistently receives 100% on customer service when Budgens mystery shoppers visit. Thornton says that Heart in Business has been so well accepted by staff that some employees have applied it in their home lives.
