The ‘Big Idea’ was an industry-leading event launched by The Co-operative. It invited suppliers and manufacturers to submit their ‘Big Idea’ aimed at helping the organisation reduce business loss and/or risk, making it a safer place for their colleagues.

With an estimated 50,000 ‘bulb-based’ external lights across the estate, Gary Harmer, Norbain’s divisional director of sales - strategic accounts, immediately saw the potential for significant cost and environmental savings for The Co-operative.

The plan was simple: replace all existing external bulb based lighting units with their far more efficient LED counterparts as supplied by lighting experts Raytec.

By doing this, Norbain and Raytec confidently predict that The Co-operative will deliver significant benefits. Because the scheme is so simple to operate, there will be no disruption to the business and a minimum amount of manpower involved. In addition to an impressive ROI, it is also predicted that significant CO2 savings will also be achieved each year.

"We are very excited by the solution offered to us by Norbain and Raytec," states Richard Quinn, Food Retail – Head of Loss Prevention for The Co-operative. "It’s very impressive that they have come up with such a simple, yet effective, plan to meet all of the objectives as outlined in the ‘Big Idea’ scheme." He goes on to say: "The Co-operative takes its responsibilities very seriously and, because the programme is so easy to implement, we can benefit from an almost immediate reduction in costs and CO2 emissions in line with our policies."

Of course, Norbain would be with The Co-operative every step of the way. "We don’t believe in just providing the equipment and then walking away," explains Gary. "We’ll be implementing a comprehensive rollout programme and ensuring that they reap the benefits of having Norbain as a reliable logistics partner."