Sustainability and Responsibility
How we work at nur Gutes
For us, sustainability is not a trend but a conviction
When we talk about sustainability, it is not because it is fashionable right now or because it is expected on a company website. We talk about it because it is at the heart of what we have been doing since 2002. When we founded nur Gutes, it was all about good food from the very start – and good food only exists when nature, people and animals are treated with respect.
For us, sustainability does not mean putting a single seal on the website and ticking the topic off. It means taking responsibility in every part of our business: in choosing our products, in running our warehouses and offices, in shipping your order, and in how we deal with food that will not keep much longer. Some things we already do really well, with others we are still on our way. This honesty is part of it for us.
In the following sections we show you what we actually do.
Renewable energy: Solar power and geothermal energy for our business
An online shop for fine food and wine needs space – and energy. Our two warehouses and offices in Nordhorn hold around 8,000 different items, many of them sensitive to temperature. Chocolate, wine, olive oil, fruit spreads and many other delicacies have to be stored under the right conditions all year round. That takes cooling in summer and heating in winter – and this is exactly where we start.
Geothermal energy: Heating and cooling without gas or heating oil
Our two warehouses and offices are heated and cooled with geothermal energy. The system uses the constant temperature of the ground to heat our rooms in winter and cool them in summer. This means we need no natural gas, no heating oil and no conventional air conditioning to store our products at the right temperature all year round. The system's heat pump runs on electricity – on sunny days also on electricity from our own solar panels.
For a fine food delivery service in particular, this is a huge advantage: our chocolates get through the summer just as unharmed as our wines get through the winter – and without gas or heating oil. Investing in geothermal energy was a conscious decision for long-term sustainability rather than short-term savings.
Photovoltaics: 60 kWp of solar power from our own roofs
On the roofs of our two warehouses we have installed photovoltaic systems with a total output of 2 × 30 kWp. We use the electricity they generate ourselves first – from the warehouse lighting and order picking to the IT infrastructure that keeps our online shop running. Whatever we need beyond that comes from the grid.
Electricity we do not use ourselves on sunny days goes into charging our electric company cars. This closes the circle: solar power from the roof flows straight into our team's mobility.
Electric mobility: Our company cars run on solar power
Our company cars are electric. And they are charged mainly with the surplus electricity from our PV systems. This means: when the sun shines on our roofs and more electricity is generated than the business needs at that moment, this electricity flows straight into our vehicles' batteries.
For us this is not a prestige project but a logical consequence. If you have the chance to generate clean energy yourself, you should use it where it makes the biggest difference. That is why we drive electrically, without exhaust fumes on site, on our daily trips – whether to the post office, to local suppliers or to appointments.
Organic certified: What this means for us
Our shop is organic certified – as required for every retailer that sells organic products. The certification allows us to trade organic products, and we are subject to the requirements of the EU Organic Regulation. Regular inspections by independent control bodies make sure that we consistently meet the requirements for labelling, storage and traceability.
We carry a growing range of certified organic products – from olive oils and fruit spreads to tea and coffee and wines from organic or biodynamic vineyards. What matters to us: organic is an important mark of quality for us, but not the only one. Some of our small manufactories are not certified organic – for example because certification does not pay off for a very small business. How they work is something we ask them directly.
That is why we always look behind the label: How is it really produced? Which ingredients are used? How does the producer handle its resources? These questions matter to us at least as much as a seal on the packaging.
Short supply chains: Directly from the producer to you
A central part of our sustainability strategy is short, transparent supply chains. We buy around three quarters of our products directly from the producer – without intermediaries.
What does that mean in practice? One example is an olive oil from Portugal that we buy directly from the oil mill. We know the producer, we have seen his olive groves, we know how he works. Another is a fruit spread from South Tyrol made by a family business we have known personally for years and visit regularly.
Buying directly has several advantages for sustainability. Transport routes become shorter and more transparent, because the goods do not travel through several wholesalers and interim warehouses. The value stays with the producer, because no intermediary takes a share of the margin. What we pay for a product goes directly to the business that makes it.
We have built and maintained this network over more than two decades. Kerstin was managing director of the association of leading delicatessen merchants in Germany and brings deep knowledge of the trade. Chambers of commerce and economic development agencies from all over Europe regularly introduce us to producers who want to bring their high-quality products to the German market. This is how we keep discovering new and exciting manufactories that share our values.
Packaging and shipping: Safely packed, with little plastic
Anyone who ships fine food and wine online faces a particular challenge: the products have to reach the customer safely and undamaged. Wine bottles, jam jars, bags of crisps, chocolate and cookware in one parcel – that takes well-thought-out packaging. At the same time, we want to use as little material as possible.
Paper, cardboard and reuse
We ship in corrugated cardboard boxes. As filling material we use packing paper and cardboard instead of plastic. Packaging material that reaches us from our suppliers – boxes, filling material, padding – we reuse whenever possible instead of throwing it away. That way, packaging often gets a second or third life with us.
Chilled shipping with paper instead of plastic
We are particularly proud of our chilled shipping system. Where many mail-order retailers rely on polystyrene boxes and plastic ice packs, we use paper: our chilled packaging is insulated with paper, and our ice packs come in a paper-based cover instead of a plastic one. You can freeze and reuse them; how to dispose of them is printed on the ice pack. This is how temperature-sensitive products such as butter, cheese or salami reach you chilled – without any polystyrene.
We only use bubble wrap in rare exceptions, when there is no equivalent plastic-free alternative. More than 9 out of 10 parcels leave our warehouse without any plastic padding at all.
Shipping: What we can influence ourselves
Your parcel is transported by our shipping partners. Where we can do something ourselves, we do: with efficient warehouse organisation that avoids unnecessary partial deliveries, and with parcel sizes that fit the contents.
Against food waste: Enjoy instead of throwing away
Every year, millions of tonnes of food are thrown away in Germany – often just because the best-before date has passed. Yet "best before" means exactly that: at least until then. It is not an expiry date but the producer's guarantee that the product keeps its full quality up to that point. In the vast majority of cases, food is perfectly fine well beyond this date.
At nur Gutes, we find it unbearable to throw away carefully made delicacies. That is why we created our sale section. There you will find products whose best-before date is coming up, or items with slight packaging damage – a small dent in the box or a torn label, for example. The contents are of course not affected.
We offer these products to you at reduced prices. You get high-quality fine food at a special price, and we keep good food out of the bin. There are no discount battles with flashy percentages at our shop – we offer fair, honest prices. That applies to the regular range just as much as to the sale.
Become a food saver: perhaps you will discover your new favourite product in our sale section – one you might never have tried at the regular price. That way, sustainability becomes a culinary adventure.
Our producers: Sustainability along the whole supply chain
Sustainability does not end at our warehouse door. It begins where our products are made – in the fields, the orchards, the oil mills, the manufactories and the cellars of our producers.
When we add a new product to our range, we ask a lot of questions. How is it produced? Where do the raw materials come from? How does the producer treat its soil, its water, its energy? Are employees paid fairly? Is animal welfare respected? We quickly notice whether someone works sustainably out of conviction or whether sustainability is just a marketing label.
Many of our long-standing partners are role models when it comes to sustainability – often long before there was any public recognition for it. Winemakers who farm their vineyards organically or biodynamically. Fruit growers who rely on old varieties and respect the natural rhythm of nature. Olive farmers who look after their centuries-old groves instead of switching to mass production. Manufactories that work by hand and in small batches instead of producing industrial quantities.
When you shop at nur Gutes, you are not only treating yourself, you are also supporting a way of doing business that puts quality before quantity. Respect before exploitation. People before machines.
Animal welfare: What we look for in animal products
Wherever animal products play a part in our range, we pay attention to the responsible treatment of animals. This applies to cheese and butter as much as to salami and ham, honey or meat products for the grill.
We prefer to work with small farms where the animals have pasture or outdoor access, for example. We are convinced you can taste the difference. A cheese from cows grazing on mountain pastures tastes different from an industrial product. A salami from pigs kept in small groups has a different quality from mass-produced goods.
Here, too, we look closely and ask. Not all of our producers carry an official animal welfare seal. That is why we find out how the animals are kept before we add a product to our range.
Our way: Honest, not perfect
We do not want to promise anything on this page that we cannot keep. Sustainability is a path, not a goal you reach one day and tick off. There are areas where we are proud of what we have achieved: our energy supply with geothermal energy and photovoltaics, our electric company cars, our direct relationships with producers, our commitment against food waste.
And there are areas where we are not that far yet: in rare cases we still use bubble wrap when there is no equivalent plastic-free alternative.
What drives us is the conviction that good food and a responsible approach to our environment are not opposites – but two sides of the same coin. The best products are made where people and nature work in harmony. And it is exactly these products we want to make available to you.
If you have questions about our sustainability measures or suggestions for us, we look forward to hearing from you. Because sustainability thrives on exchange – and on people who care.
Kerstin and Stephan Uhlenbusch