Sainsbury’s staff have suggested more than 20,000 improvements that could be made to the retailer and more than 2,000 have been implemented in the past four years, according to CEO Justin King. The ideas were put forward for Sainsbury’s Tell Justin scheme, which enables staff to write to the chief executive with suggestions and led to the recent Channel 4 series I’m Running Sainsbury’s.

“They are generally small changes such as not printing out reports that people don’t need to save paper,” King told The Grocer. “We are using different routes for lorries – we had a great one from a driver who said our routing system took him on a longer route. He knew a better one, which saved us a load of money.

“There have also been lots of changes around environmental issues in terms of how we can switch off lights and fridges – thousands and thousands.”