Lowe's Canada, committed to reducing its environmental footprint

Tangible measures are rolled out to encourage customers to use less plastic bags

Boucherville, QC – May 31, 2018 — Committed to reducing the environmental footprint of its operations, including the amount of waste sent to landfills, Lowe’s Canada announces the deployment of tangible measures to encourage its customers to use less plastic bags. Starting June 1st in Quebec and September 1st in other Canadian provinces, standard plastic bags will be charged 5¢ and thicker plastic bags of 50 microns and more will be charged 10¢ in all Lowe’s, RONA and Reno-Depot corporate stores. Profits from this initiative will be donated to Nature Conservancy Canada to fund conservancy projects throughout the country.

"Reducing the environmental footprint of our products and operations is at the heart of Lowe’s Canada’s corporate responsibility strategy. Yet, each year, Canadian consumers who visit our stores across the country leave with millions of plastic bags. By charging these bags, we hope to provide a deterrent and incite our customers to change their shopping habits,” explains Jean-Sébastien Lamoureux, senior vice-president, Communications, public affairs and compliance for Lowe’s Canada. “Bringing reusable shopping bags when going grocery shopping has become a habit for a lot of people now and we want to encourage them to do the same when visiting our stores. We are convinced that, combined with our in-store awareness initiatives, this measure will help us significantly reduce the number of plastic bags used in our stores."

Several recovery and recycling measures already implemented

This new measure builds on the several recovery and recycling initiatives already in place within the Lowe’s Canada network of corporate stores. In addition to being the retailer recovering the largest quantity of paint in Canada (in 2017 alone, 3,545 tons of paint were recycled thanks to the program in place), Lowe’s Canada also implemented programs to recover compact fluorescent light bulbs, batteries, wood and building materials such as gypsum and styrofoam.

"Additional initiatives that would allow us to reduce even more the environmental footprint of the company are currently being considered. For example, we want to collaborate more closely with our vendor partners to find solutions to reduce packaging for products sold in our stores", concludes Ms. Lamoureux.

About Lowe's Canada
Lowe’s Companies, Inc. (NYSE: LOW) is a FORTUNE® 50 home improvement company serving more than 18 million customers a week in the United States, Canada and Mexico. With fiscal year 2017 sales of $68.6 billion, Lowe’s and its related businesses operate or service more than 2,390 home improvement and hardware stores and employ over 310,000 people. Based in Boucherville, Quebec, Lowe’s Canadian business, together with its wholly owned subsidiary, RONA inc., operates or services more than 630 corporate and independent affiliate dealer stores in a number of complementary formats under different banners. These include Lowe’s, RONA, Réno-Dépôt, Dick’s Lumber, Contractor First, and Ace. In Canada, the companies have more than 28,000 employees, in addition to nearly 5,000 employees in the stores of RONA’s independent affiliate dealers.