An average of 1.8 million customers every single day—that is something a retail company has to manage first. The drugstore chain dm, founded by Götz Werner in 1973, manages to do just that. With 2,100 stores and 48,000 employees, it is today Germany's largest drugstore and a real market force—not just in shampoos and soaps, but also in sustainability and its communication. Millions of German citizens read, hear, and buy what dm produces, says, and sells. That is why people look closely at what the Karlsruhe-based corporation communicates—and that is why it sometimes has lawyers on its back. Environmental Action Germany (Deutsche Umwelthilfe), for example, has accused the brand of greenwashing with its "environmentally neutral" label.
It is all the more commendable that Kerstin Erbe is here to answer our questions today. The dm managing director previously worked at Colgate and Johnson & Johnson and has been responsible for dm brands and sustainability for 7 years. And without a doubt, the corporation does a great deal in this area. The only question is: how do you convey it? How do you inform customers, employees, and other stakeholders without boring them on the one hand—or leaving too much out on the other? What do you do when environmentalists, of all people, attack you for your environmental communication?
We discuss all of this in this episode with Kerstin Erbe—a manager whose decisions literally affect millions of people.