Sustainability by Planzer: our plan P for people and the environment

For us as a family stock corporation, our priorities are clear: long-term action instead of short-term profit maximisation. We offer our customers resource-conserving logistics services. We strive to ensure that our employees are well trained and can strike a healthy work-life balance. We also support value creation in the regions and social issues in which we are active.

Services that do us all good

Focus on rail

To minimise our emissions of exhaust gases and pollutants in road transport, we use various modes of transport to move your shipments and apply the insights from research and development. Today, we already transport 60% of our transport volume via our 13 railway centres using low-emission rail transport. That amounts to 11 million clean rail kilometres every year. In 2018, we were able to avoid 42,804 truck trips or 7,406 tonnes of CO₂ emissions.

Optimised fleet

Around 90% of our own vehicles currently meet the Euro 6 emissions standard. We want to increase this share to 100% in the foreseeable future. For our contract drivers, the figure is already over 50%.

Electric fleet

For the distribution in cities and agglomerations, we use our own e-trucks whenever possible: this technology is 100% emission-free, quiet and protects the environment and society. However, the purchase costs are still enormously high and the operating range with a full battery is limited. So we’ve decided to invest in further low-emission vehicles: e-cars, e-cargo bikes and even two horse-drawn carriages in Zermatt.

Conduct

At our training centres, our drivers undergo training for environmentally optimised driving and the environmentally sound use of the vehicle. We train our dispatchers for low-emission route planning. This includes avoiding wasteful, CO2-producing empty runs. We regularly train our warehouse logistics employees for precision and quality with targeted instruction.

Our sustainability report

Every year, we tally up our CO₂e emissions using the tank-to-wheel (TTW) approach and publish the results in our sustainability report. In doing so, we prove our environmental performance for road and rail transport and for the entire group. We can actually evaluate the CO₂e emissions per customer and make that data available.

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Maintenance

To identify technical problems with an impact on emissions at an early stage, we subject all commercial vehicles to regular maintenance in our in-house workshops.

Warehouse logistics

In 2019, our warehouse logistics operations posted CO₂ emissions of 8 grams per kilogram of goods. This corresponds to an extremely pleasing reduction of 16.9% CO₂ per processed kilogram compared to the previous year. We measure the performance of our value creation in warehouse logistics using indicators such as deadline quotas, warehouse set-up errors and on time in full (OTIF). The more precisely and thus resourcefully we manage warehouse orders, the greater our OTIF figure. In other words: thanks to precision and quality in warehouse logistics, we reduce our CO₂ equivalence in warehouse logistics.

Real estate

We also conduct comprehensive facility management for all company properties and carry out preventive maintenance on them. Since 2014, we have collected and analysed the energy consumption of our 14 high-consumption locations with over 500 MWh of electricity consumption per year. For these properties, we have concluded a target agreement with the site cantons and the federal government and maintain compliance through recurring and regular measures. In terms of the energy balance of our buildings, we strive to achieve net-zero emissions wherever possible.

Health

A healthy working environment and fair working conditions are important to us. We maintain a generous social insurance policy. Moreover, our employees benefit from attractive preferential rates for health and accident insurance.

Satisfaction and motivation

We maintain an ongoing dialogue with our employees. This exchange promotes our company’s development and innovative strength. We include our employees in decisions wherever possible, such as when designing workspaces or working-time models.

Training and development

Qualified employees are our most important asset. We maintain two company-owned training centres with a driving school and training workshop. We primarily recruit driving instructors and instructors from our own ranks. For the first five days of their employment, we introduce new drivers to the Planzer environment at our training centres.

Fostering junior talent

In 2019, over 350 apprentices worked for us. That amounts to 8.91% of our total group workforce. We aim to keep at least two-thirds of apprentices on after their apprenticeships. Our average is around 60%.

Social commitment

We have local roots and work far beyond the country’s borders. That’s also why we get involved in the community. We support various organisations with financial resources and benefits in kind. The topics of mobility, safety and sustainability are particularly important to us.