Five Companies Redefining VM’s Sustainability Brief

Somewhere between bespoke fixtures and a store’s next-best hit lives retail's most disposable medium. Visual merchandising is a 140-year-old practice where process meets performance. Consider it the bridge between brands, products, and dopamine junkies. Its magic moves across aesthetics as naturally as a Gagosian artist. Its genius pushes boundaries as strategically as a next-gen head of brand. By definition, this silent merchant has more pull than a hundred megaphones combined.

With a hold that extends far beyond setting, retail’s fluency in desire thrives in visual merchandising’s sales-bound conversion. However, a legacy is only as good as the sum of its parts, and fast culture holds a key plank of the sales pitch. 

Retail's most visible language is also the least accounted for. Over a century into its run, visual merchandising’s core business still relies on mixed materials, energy-intensive lighting, and a quick seasonal turnover for survival. New sets appear as fast as they vanish, and no one really knows where they go after takedown. 

Coachtopia,The Wonder Room, Selfridges. Photo: StudioXAG

Unlike standard products with supply chain tracking systems, most temporary display assets lack centralized traceability management. In 2022, POPAI UK found that while 86% of retailers claimed to recycle their displays, very few could actually verify the outcomes due to inadequate auditing, timely reporting, and real-time data collection. 

The lack of industry-wide policies compounds the environmental damage of single-use displays. Visual merchandising’s design process centers around the initial, top-of-funnel impact in consumer engagement but gives little consideration to the eventual, and often complex, disassembly and disposal of these temporary set-ups.

As of 2025, there’s not an audited, global figure for how much display waste ends up in landfill. Because retail promotion is a high-volume practice used by nearly every major brand around the world, the absence of traceability data and circularity regulations show evidence of how unsustainable visual processes continue to carry the true hidden cost of high retail performance.

While the industry expands to meet the demands of today’s overserved consumer, a quieter countercurrent is taking shape. 

Circularity in visual merchandising highlights the importance of sustainability in retail promotion by considering the entire lifecycle of display materials and its components. Initiatives like low-energy consumption, modular reuse, second-life pipelines, and digital technology levers are driving retailers to adopt more responsible practices in their display strategies. 

Here are the five companies redefining visual merchandising’s sustainability brief.

THE ESTÉE LAUDER COMPANIES

Le Labo Kyoto Machiya Store. Photo : Retail Design Blog

In 2023, the Estée Lauder Companies (ELC) launched its Responsible Store Design (RSD) program. More than change, the internal third party-assured program offers a codified retail standard that merges premium aesthetics with brand experience and circularity ethics. 

RSD uses a points-based scoring system that evaluates new and existing stores globally. Participating brands that meet the program’s prerequisites are evaluated on various sustainability efforts, from developing waste management plans for new store build-outs and installing energy- and water-efficient fixtures, to responsible sourcing and design of store materials, store operations, and innovation. 

Existing stores are assessed against a checklist of requirements in order to participate in the program. These include installing energy-efficient technologies to reduce energy use in store fixtures (such as LED lighting and ENERGY STAR-rated equipment), deploying energy-efficient store closing procedures, and having on-site recycling measures for employees and customers, among others.

RSD also implements a checklist of end-of-life criteria for visual merchandising. Among them is using materials that are easily recycled in curbside systems, creating visual assets free of virgin acrylic and minimizing packaging, as well as avoiding integrated lighting in displays to reduce waste, lessen energy use, and improve recyclability. 

The program underscores the company’s commitment to environmental conservation. As of FY 2024, ELC’s sustainability efforts have diverted 99.8% of industrial waste from landfill, reduced their water withdrawal by 23%, and reduced absolute Scope 1 and 2 greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 37%.

Most recently, RSD was recognized with the 2024 Consumer Environmental Impact Award at the 6th annual WWD BeautyInc Awards China, where it has benefited more than 30 store locations. 

FORTNUM & MASON

Fortnum and Mason's 2025 Autunm Windows

Behind Fortnum & Mason’s enviable stagecraft runs a system that aims for net-zero landfill waste. Future Matters is Fortnum’s sustainability strategy that reinforces its commitment to long-lasting environmental change and social values driven by three key pillars: people, product, and planet. 

Future Matters embraces a dynamic approach to making. It inspires a community-driven effort to revise and reimagine the synergy between luxury retail and sustainable design.

In its 2023-24 Sustainability and Social Responsibility Report, the company recounted a 7.4% decarbonization achievement. What was once a milestone has become an ongoing partnership with Planet Mark, combined with energy-saving initiatives, and rigorous “reduce, reuse, recycle” waste diversion methods as part of Fortnum’s Net Zero Journey.

'Dung Beetle' by Rod & Amy Holt, created using workshop materials and prop leftovers. Photo Luxurious Magazine

At the Piccadilly flagship store, these principles echo through every corner of its prime real estate. 

In 2025, the retailer’s autumn window displays were brilliantly fashioned by skilled artists exclusively using in-store waste materials. The project included names like Billie Achilleos, Paul Badham, Michelle Reader, Barbara Franc, David Ferrer, Josh Gluckstein, as well as Fortum’s own in-house artist and prop maker Amy Holt, all under the leadership of Sallie Smith, Head of Visual Presentation.

From salvaged prop leftovers, reclaimed paper, and metal scraps to recycled cardboard boxes and leftover Christmas brochures, Fortnum's 'Resourceful Animals' turned rubble into stunning works of art to celebrate nature's own “greatest tidy-uppers,” and the beauty of transformation. 

Permanence continues to define Fortnum’s approach to sustainability. While recycling Queen Anne's half-burned candles kickstarted the business in 1707, today it extends to in-store furniture and fixtures reimagining materials from the store’s discards into fabric upholstery, exterior facades, and interior surfaces.

CHRISTIAN DIOR COUTURE

• Dior New York. Photo : LVMH

Ever dreamed of having Christian Dior’s displays adorning your home, your daughter’s room, or a special occasion like the upcoming holiday season? 

With the support of parent company LVMH's DARE intrepreneurial program, Dior launched ‘Open Windows Charity Sale’ in Paris earlier this year, an innovative private sale that gave window displays a second life. 

Unlike other brands who would rather dispose of their visual assets before seeing them displayed elsewhere, over 5000 decorative objects by the Dior Couture VM Team were sold internally. 

Christian Dior Couture 'Open Window Charity Sale'

The event brought together numerous departments, employees, and supplying partners, whose efforts reaped impactful company-wide benefits, from freeing 600 m³ (21,188.8 cubic feet) of storage space to benefiting local charity associations Les Restos du Cœur and les Petits Princes, as confirmed by the organizers Frédéric Briot, VM Operations Director, Alice Dey, VM Purchasing & Compliance Manager, and Sophie Chou, Senior Marketing Communications Purchasing Manager of LVMH Sourcing. 

This isn’t the first time that the French fashion House implements creative circularity solutions to minimize display waste. 

In 2023, Dior’s visual merchandising teams reimagined unused stock and atelier scraps for the 30 Montaigne flagship’s anniversary windows. These installations were later salvaged and reused across its global store network.

Dior’s upcycling initiatives extend to the runway. By 2026, the company aims for 100% of runway sets to be reused, donated, or recycled. 

At large, LVMH recognizes environmental excellence in retail spaces through its LIFE 360 in Stores Awards, a biannual program that honors stores for their sustainable initiatives evaluated across 50 specific criteria by TERAO, an independent external auditor. Baseline practices cover waste reduction, water and energy conservation, as well as responsible material sourcing and visual merchandising across 6,000+ retail locations.

The second edition of the Open Windows Charity Sale was recently celebrated in October 2025.

PATAGONIA

Patagonia Casa Frey in Bariloche, Argentina

Patagonia stores run at a different rhythm from fashion, beauty, and high-end consumer goods. The company’s global owned-and-operated facilities paint a full picture of their sustainability and social responsibility goals, where minimizing visual merchandising waste is achieved through effective product zoning and modular design.

While capturing a shopper's immediate attention is crucial, Patagonia’s holistic visual merchandising strategy aims for a deeper, more sustained impact in the customer journey. 

Years before third-place hangout popularity, the retailer reimagined physical store locations as community gathering spots where consumers could engage with product and staff through environmental, animal, and social justice activations that align its brand with global environmental leadership. 

In store, dedicated Worn Wear sections for used, repaired, and repurposed Patagonia gear highlight the value of existing products, while repair stations and touring workshops encourage consumers to extend the life of their own items.

Patagonia is no stranger to storytelling. Beyond its adaptive reuse for its physical store locations, the brand’s standardized in-store configuration is intentionally modular, designed to shift, scale, educate and surprise.

The retailer follows a waste diversion strategy that ensures all visual merchandising materials are recyclable, from transportation to display, prioritizing 100% reclaimed and recyclable materials for fixtures to help minimize new material consumption. Its design framework emphasizes timelessness to guarantee they’re reused, composted, or recycled at the end of their useful life. Strategic brand partnerships also provide a circular solution for furniture, fixtures, and display materials. 

To further advance their mission for sustainable visual merchandising, Patagonia integrates digital elements, such as interactive kiosks and digital displays, aligned with their renewable electricity adoption goals, which reached 98% globally in FY 2024, alongside responsible service provider guidelines that streamline leadership’s procuring efforts.

STUDIOXAG

Hello, Earth speaking by StudioXAG in collaboration with the Good Plastic Company at Milan Design Week 2024. Photo: StudioXAG

How do you tell stories people actually care about nowadays? You turn your business as a force for good. At least that’s what StudioXAG does so well.

As one of the first in its field to become a Certified B Corporation, StudioXAG represents the new role of agencies working up-front with fashion, beauty, lifestyle and cultural brands to build dynamic spaces where visitors can let go and responsible design can live up to its name. 

For a B Corp certification, businesses must meet high standards of social and environmental performance, transparency, and legal accountability in transforming the global economy to benefit all people, communities and the planet. The award-winning studio that operates between London and Amsterdam earned its designation in 2022, and yet, its radical circularity initiatives still feel refreshing three years later. 

An interactive pop-up with a twist for Ikea. Photo: StudioXAG

StudioXAG’s magic-meets-logic approach ensures that every project stage, from design to execution, is shaped by its environmental impact. 

As part of their carbon-free journey, the company introduced a sustainable procurement policy designed to cut supply chain emissions by 95% in 2035, as well as a Net Zero Strategy goal that displays the alchemy between sustainability and creativity as a viable possibility for the future of retail design. 

For the studio, decarbonization efforts involve all areas of business, from purchased goods and services to staff training and travel, “We are committed to identifying and reducing emissions hotspots across the entire value chain. This includes reduction commitments from not only us, but our suppliers, partners and key stakeholders as well.”

StudioXAG’s sustainability goals have marked a turning point in their practice. In 2023, the studio re-launched XAGzero, an intelligent carbon insights tool used for measuring and offsetting carbon footprint across retail projects and collaborations with comprehensive data that covers delivery, installation, production, and material choices. 

The team also partners with external organizations and initiatives to guide their decision making and further their goals, including the Materials Council, BSI, Terra Neutra, and Science-Based Targets, as well as participating in community building campaigns, like Cool Earth, Choose Love, and Shelter.

In house, the studio has optimized their everyday workflow with energy-efficient facilities that use 100% renewable energy, and through COGS (Company Objectives and Goals), a tri-annual program that continues to foster employee innovation since its launch in 2019. 

For many, their most recent recognition as Design Agency of the Year at the 2025 Creative Retail Awards comes as no surprise. StudioXAG offers a unique bridge for brands seeking both craft and circularity with retail magic, human touch and meaning.

THE TAKEAWAY

As the evolution of circular visual merchandising keeps taking shape, here are key strategies that brands can already adopt to implement retail’s new sustainability playbook:

_ Make sustainability non-negotiable at spec level.

Before concepting begins, define allowed and prohibited materials, recyclability requirements, energy standards, and comprehensive disassembly guidelines.

_ Design for end-of-life.

Identify how displays, props, and fixtures will be recovered, refurbished, resold, or donated. Upcycle past display elements for new campaigns to optimize costs and reduce waste.

_ Standardize modularity.

Develop systems that can be reconfigured across seasons and markets to replace one-off builds and integrate recovery into distribution logistics.

_ Map and document material journeys.

Maintain digital passports for each display asset: material composition, supplier, recyclability rating, adhesives used, expected lifespan, and recovery partner. This approach anticipates the EU's ESPR/DPP requirements and strengthens internal reporting.

_ Choose your partners wisely.

Handpick vendors based on diversion rates, verified recycling and refurb certificates. Seek third-party audits and compliance frameworks to make data-driven decisions. External verification gives sustainability data credibility and team accountability.

_ Extend sustainability beyond aesthetics.

Lead by measures that sustain the people who sustain your business. Specify people-first standards, like using low-dust substrates and creating comprehensive takedown plans; design safe installation rhythms, such as overnight caps, mental-health support, and paid recovery time in peak periods; and bake wellbeing into procurement.