Climate control: How grocers are responding to weather disruptions

Keeping the doors open during extreme weather events

When faced with an extreme weather event, grocers must ensure their stores remain operational—both for their community and the bottom line. “Every minute I don’t have the store open, every minute I don’t have my registers operating, every minute I’m not transacting with shoppers is a significant cost,” says David Marcotte, senior vice-president at Kantar.

Aldi USA, which has more than 2,500 stores across the United States, prioritizes climate-resilient design solutions when planning and constructing new stores, as well as when renovating existing locations.

“We have a responsibility to keep our doors open in order to provide high-quality, affordable groceries to our communities, especially when they need us most,” says Amber Hardy, director of systems and sustainability at Aldi USA. For example, several Aldi stores are equipped with impact-resistant glass to better withstand high winds and flying debris in storm-prone regions.

“In high-risk areas, we incorporate site-specific resilience strategies, such as elevating structures in flood zones and reinforcing roofing systems,” Hardy says. “We power 215 stores and 16 distribution centres with solar or wind energy, which helps minimize demand on the grid during extreme weather, including heat waves and cold spells, while also helping us reduce our emissions. Looking ahead, we plan to add solar energy systems to 70 to 90 additional stores each year.”

At Pattison Food Group  (PFG), climate risk is increasingly a consideration in its site selection and facility design. For example, the company assesses risks such as floodplain exposure and extreme temperatures when selecting sites or planning infrastructure upgrades. “Where feasible, we are incorporating energy-efficient systems, backup power solutions and resilient building materials to enhance reliability and reduce operating emissions,” the company said in an email to Canadian Grocer.

On the transportation front, PFG ensures continuity during extreme weather events through an emergency logistics response protocol. Its solutions have included using e-commerce delivery vans to access areas where large transport trucks can’t operate, rerouting shipments through alternative transportation corridors and temporarily fulfilling orders from different warehouse locations. “In critical situations, we have also airlifted essential goods—such as pharmaceuticals and baby formula—to remote communities that have been cut off,” said PFG.

Shoring up supply chains

Climate-related disruptions don’t just threaten physical stores—they also impact food at the source. As the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency notes, climate change can make conditions better or worse for growing crops in different regions. For example, while a longer growing season could allow farmers to diversify crops, it could also limit the types of crops grown or increase demand for irrigation. Other risks include heavy precipitation that can harm crops by eroding soil and depleting soil nutrients, and droughts, with effects ranging from slowed plant growth to severe crop loss.

The current global cocoa shortage, for example, is said to be exacerbated by drought and other climate-related issues. Meanwhile, droughts in Brazil and Vietnam—the world’s two largest coffee producers—are impacting global coffee supply and pricing.

Read: Hershey and other chocolate makers hike prices as cocoa remains near record highs

As grocers know well, adapting sourcing strategies is essential to address this latest challenge. “COVID triggered a massive conversation about supply chain resilience and security,” says Sarah Burch, executive director of the Waterloo Climate Institute at the University of Waterloo. “On the heels of that, there’s been increasing awareness about how climate change plays into it as well.”

For PFG, diversification is key. “On the supply chain side, our procurement team has focused on building resilience by diversifying where products are sourced, as growing seasons and regions continue to shift due to climate change,” the company said. “We have developed a robust supplier framework that includes a strong emphasis on local suppliers and greenhouse-grown products. This diversified approach reduces our reliance on vulnerable growing regions and enhances our ability to maintain product availability throughout the year.”

Beyond diversification, retailers can play a crucial role in supporting climate adaptation solutions along the supply chain, while helping their suppliers become more resilient. “If we’re trying to shift our crops towards more climate-resilient varieties, that requires some forethought—and grocery retailers can be a part of that,” says Burch. “They can negotiate prices with distributors and producers in a way that recognizes the value of climate resilience. They can share solutions and best practices and build a community of practice around risk and climate-resilient supply chains.”

Building deep and lasting relationships between retailers, suppliers and distributors is essential, adds Burch. “It’s not the job of any one firm or any one segment in that supply chain—there needs to be a collective effort towards climate resilience.”

Deloitte’s Solly agrees that stronger supplier relationships are key to supporting climate-resilient practices, such as regenerative agriculture, which helps improve soil and water management while increasing yields. Grocers can also consider more local sourcing and vertical farming operations closer to home. “You can shorten your supply chains by doing that,” Solly says. “It also helps you avoid disruptions from climate events in other regions—whether it’s hurricanes, floods or cyclones—and products can’t get through.”

From a technology perspective, data-driven insights can strengthen climate resilience across the supply chain. Chloe Barnabe, director of sustainability and transformation at EY Canada, notes that many companies have supply chain control towers that monitor real-time data on shipments and inventory.

“A big opportunity is better connecting that data with climate risk teams and using those data-driven insights to help inform business continuity and climate scenario planning,” she says.

Beating the heat—in stores and on the roads

With hotter days becoming the norm, grocers are challenged with the strain this puts on day-today operations. What’s under the most pressure is often the HVAC system—and it’s a chronic issue, according to Jake Helman, principal consultant at Resilient Analytics, a Stanley Consultants company, which helps organizations build climate resilience.

“If you’re running your HVAC and refrigerant systems every day and it’s hotter, they’re simply less efficient and use more energy, which hits your bottom line over the course of months and years,” he says. Higher temperatures can also affect distribution centres and workforce productivity, with employees more likely to feel unwell or take sick days, he explains.

A key solution lies in improving HVAC efficiencies. While this is typically considered on the sustainability side—helping retailers reduce carbon emissions—it can also be used for climate resilience, says Helman. “Higher-efficiency HVAC equipment might not have a return on investment immediately but could in the future because of the increase in temperature, specifically for coolant because you’re using it so much and there’s so much wear and tear,” he says. “So, incorporating these factors into your capital improvement plans is a critical step.”

Smart technology offers another solution. Solly notes that Deloitte has been working with retailers on implementing AI-powered energy management systems. These systems use real-time data from sensors to optimize HVAC performance, extend the life of HVAC systems and lower energy costs, while significantly reducing carbon emissions. “Better energy efficiency technologies are paramount to help manage these swings in demand for heating and cooling,” Solly says.

Climate challenges aren’t just limited to store operations—higher temperatures are also affecting how food is moved. According to Marcotte from Kantar, more goods are now transported in refrigerated trucks—even items that previously didn’t require cooling on the road. “If you have a truck going across Canada in the summer, the potential for it being 40 degrees is high,” he says. “If that truck breaks down or gets delayed, you can cook the load—something that wouldn’t have been part of your planning process 10 years ago.” 

This new reality is why the direct impacts of climate change must be part of a grocer’s overall risk management strategy. “You have to go through scenario planning of: What happens if the average temperature in the summer goes up by two degrees? What will my energy use be? What’s the potential for equipment failure?” says Marcotte. “You need to get in front of the whole risk-mitigation process much more intensely than you used to. You can’t quite make it up as you go along.”

TOP TIPS FROM THE EXPERTS 

Best practices for grocers to build climate resilience

• DO A THOROUGH ASSESSMENT. “Conduct a climate scenario analysis exercise with the risk team and other internal teams to understand what those risks are to the business and what mitigation strategies are already in place,” says EY Canada’s Chloe Barnabe. “Many companies will begin with qualitative assessments of those risks, but more are starting to look at the quantitative financial impacts.”
• GET MORE PEOPLE AROUND THE TABLE. Building climate resilience isn’t something one team can do alone. “Avoid having a siloed approach. Have stakeholder engagement across all aspects of the business because it’s a lot easier to make decisions when other people are informed,” says Jake Helman from Resilient Analytics.
• COLLABORATE WITH INDUSTRY PEERS, KNOWLEDGE NETWORKS AND OUTSIDE EXPERTS.     “You have to look to information and partners to help you get through this because it’s not easy,” says Joe Solly from Deloitte. “It’s a new muscle you’ve got to build—new learnings, knowledge and insights—on how to run your business.” Sarah Burch from the Waterloo Climate Institute advises building partnerships with scientists and experts who have knowledge about climate impacts, agriculture and supply chain logistics.

• ALIGN YOUR SOLUTIONS WITH YOUR CLIMATE GOALS                                                                                        When adapting to climate change, retailers need to ensure their fixes don't add to the problem. "If you need more cooling or refrigeration for your facilities, but you're burning coal to produce the electricity that powers it, you're causing more of the same problems," says Burch. "So, switching to renewables that produce the electricity to help you deal with the impacts of climate change is like a double good."

   

This article was first published in Canadian Grocer's August 2025 issue.