GROHE STRIVES FOR A BETTER AND GREENER TOMORROW WITH LESS PLASTIC INITIATIVE

Grohe Americas Reaches Milestone in Combatting Global Plastic Waste

PISCATAWAY, N.J., April 20, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Every year, eight million tons of plastic waste fill the world's oceans¹, and the pollution of the oceans by plastic waste alone has increased tenfold since 1980². GROHE, part of LIXIL, a global manufacturer of pioneering water and housing products, reaches a milestone in its efforts to tackle the global waste problem and its impact on water by continuously improving its products, processes and services.  This initiative is in line with LIXIL's Plastic Action Statement, a commitment that serves as the basis for all business processes, products and services to reduce plastics across the world.

"With water at the core of our business, it is our responsibility to care for every drop of this precious resource and commit to paving a pathway for clean water worldwide. GROHE's Less Plastic Initiative will bring us a step closer to this goal," said Trey Northrup, Leader, LIXIL Americas. "As a purpose-driven business, we are wholly dedicated to reducing the use of plastic within our own footprint and encouraging our customers to live more sustainably. Our belief is that it's critical to give our planet the utmost care and attention now and into the future."

GROHE, known globally for its sleek German design and engineering technology which provide exceptional experiences that consistently deliver the Pure Freude an Wasser (Pure Joy of Water), has environment and sustainability at the forefront of its brand strategy. It is committed to protecting the environment and conserving resources through its environment sensible business processes. This starts with a comprehensive approach, including eliminating the use of all unnecessary plastic and a move to establish carbon-neutral facilities.

In 2022 and beyond, GROHE will greatly contribute to tackling the global plastic waste problem with its three-step Less Plastic Initiative:

1. Removal of Plastic from Packaging – To date, GROHE has removed and replaced all unnecessary plastic from product packaging. This has resulted in savings of around 37 million items of product packaging made of plastic. To do this, GROHE has increasingly used molded pulp inserts – which consumers may know from egg cartons – instead of expanding polystyrene or wrapping film solution. They are made of recycled paper and can be recycled again and again. Though GROHE achieved this major milestone this spring, the brand will continue to work on innovative packaging solutions and make its packaging even more sustainable.
2. Development of GROHE Blue Water System – The GROHE Blue Chilled & Sparkling 2.0 water system provides chilled, filtered and, if desired, carbonated water straight from the kitchen tap – with a perfect taste. Thanks to this intelligent functionality, this resource-saving solution not only reduces the ecological footprint, but also enables consumers to live more sustainably.
3. Partnership with everwave – Since 2019, GROHE has supported the non-governmental organization (NGO), everwave—an interdisciplinary team of scientists, engineers and marine biologists developing active and passive clean-up technologies for rivers, to collect waste before it pollutes the oceans. GROHE's cooperation goes beyond financial support—both GROHE and everwave also are working to raise public awareness of the plastic problem and create understanding and desire for a more sustainable lifestyle.

In addition to its global plastic waste initiatives, becoming carbon-neutral has been a long-term goal for the GROHE brand and parent company, LIXIL, which began in 2007 by assessing its carbon footprint. As a result, since 2020 all eight LIXIL fittings plants as well as the German logistics centers of the GROHE brand are CO2-neutral*. In 2021, the GROHE outbound logistics became CO₂-neutral*, and to offset unavoidable CO₂ emissions in the future, GROHE has pledged to support compensation projects.

To learn more about GROHE's sustainability initiatives, please visit https://www.grohe.com/sustainability/.

About GROHE  
GROHE is a leading global brand for complete bathroom solutions and kitchen fittings and has a total of over 7,000 employees in 150 countries – 2,600 of them are based in Germany. Since 2014 GROHE has been part of the strong brand portfolio of the Japanese manufacturer of pioneering water and housing products LIXIL. In order to offer "Pure Freude an Wasser" (Pure Joy of Water), every GROHE product is based on the brand values of quality, technology, design and sustainability. Renowned highlights such as GROHE thermostat series as well as groundbreaking innovations such as the GROHE Blue Chilled & Sparkling water system underline the brand's profound expertise. Focused on customer needs, GROHE thus creates intelligent, life-enhancing and sustainable product solutions that offer relevant added value – and bear the "Made in Germany" seal of quality: R&D and design are firmly anchored as an integrated process in Germany. GROHE takes its corporate responsibility very seriously and focuses on a resource-saving value chain. Since April 2020, the sanitary brand has been producing CO₂-neutral* worldwide. In spring 2022, GROHE reached another major milestone by removing all unnecessary plastic packaging from its products.   

In the past ten years alone, more than 490 design and innovation awards as well as several sustainability awards confirmed GROHE's success. GROHE was the first in its industry to win the CSR Award of the German Federal Government and the German Sustainability Award 2021 in the categories "Resources" and "Design". As part of the sustainability and climate campaign "50 Sustainability & Climate Leaders," GROHE is also driving sustainable transformation.  

*includes CO₂ compensation projects, more on green.grohe.com 

About LIXIL 
LIXIL (TSE Code 5938) makes pioneering water and housing products that solve everyday, real-life challenges, making better homes a reality for everyone, everywhere. Drawing on our Japanese heritage, we create world-leading technology and innovate to make high quality products that transform homes. But the LIXIL difference is how we do this; through meaningful design, an entrepreneurial spirit, a dedication to improving accessibility for all, and responsible business growth. Our approach comes to life through industry leading brands, including INAX, GROHE, American Standard, and TOSTEM, [as well as specialty brands such as DXV]. Approximately 55,000 colleagues operating in more than 150 countries are proud to make products that touch the lives of more than a billion people every day. 

¹ Our planet is drowning in plastic pollution – it's time for change: https://www.unep.org/interactive/beat-plastic-pollution/
 ² The Global Risks Report 2020: http://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_Global_Risk_Report_2020.pdf; page 46

SOURCE Grohe