The Impact Fund

Sébastian Pellion - Head of Impact and Sustainability
Sébastian Pellion - Head of Impact and Sustainability
March 13, 2023 • 5 minutes

Newton’s 3rd law of motion states that every action has an equal and opposite reaction. Simply put, this means that anything you push on pushes back on you; the bigger the push, the bigger the push back. 

While metaphors are probably better left in the hands of great writers rather than physicists, Newton unknowingly revealed a truth that determines more than just energy. For the more energy we put into something, the more we get out of it, each action relying on the other for maximum impact. 

Impact is the push back that we strive for on a daily basis at Glovo. We believe that it is our duty to leverage our core business to solve some of the major social and environmental challenges the world is facing in a way that makes business sense. That’s our definition of impact and we couldn’t do it without the Impact Fund. 

What is the Impact Fund?

The premise of the Impact Fund is simple. For every order that Glovo delivers to a customer, a small amount of our revenue margin goes to financing impact & sustainability projects. Apart from ensuring continuous funding for these projects, the Impact Fund is a way to make sure the more our business grows, the more positive impact is generated. 

By the end of 2023, the Impact Fund will have dedicated up to €5 million since  its start in mid-2021. This strategy will help us scale our impact in the longer term by creating new business models combining the generation of profits with the creation of social and environmental value for society.

We decided to focus our efforts in contributing to solve 3 important UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) by launching several impact programs whose costs are financed through the Impact Fund:

Make cities more sustainable, inclusive, resilient

  • Glovo Access: We are covering delivery costs for NGOs so they can access our last-mile logistics for free and distribute anything to vulnerable families. More than 2.3 million meals delivered through Glovo Access to date since March 2020. This program is also aimed at reducing food waste and carbon emissions.

Decent work & economic growth

  • Glovo Local: We are investing in small & medium sized businesses by helping them to digitize their business while growing their online channels. The Impact Fund covers promotional campaigns for these local businesses, guaranteeing more visibility to their stores in the Glovo app. So far, ~8000 small businesses have been supported in 2022.
  • The Courier’s Pledge: We are financing courier learning and development programs via G-Learning to support couriers in their professional development and aid them in qualifying for new employment opportunities. To date,  approximately 13% of the fleet are actively participating in training programs with a focus on: entrepreneurship, financial education, coding, and more.
  • Diversity and inclusion: We are financing boot camps for young women eager to start a tech career in Spain. In 2022, we started a collaboration with KeepCoding to train 200 women in data analytics and web development in a 6 month program.

Take urgent action to fight climate change

  • Climate Action: We are working with our partners, couriers, and users to reduce carbon emissions derived from packaging, food waste, and the vehicle fleet. Thanks to the Impact Fund, we were able to reduce the price of green packaging to boost its competitiveness versus single-use plastic packaging, or to improve affordability of electric vehicles for couriers. In 2022, 8,800 tonnes of CO2 emissions were reduced across our value chain.

Additionally, to maintain our efforts in Ukraine, we decided to dedicate part of the Impact Fund to support local NGOs helping communities impacted by the war. More than €550,000 have been donated in 2022. 

How we make an impact 

We have embedded an impact mindset into the way we run the company to develop and scale sustainable business models. 

 Our Impact & Sustainability team plays a key role as an innovation hub, designing and piloting innovative ways of doing business that preserves our planet and our communities. But the most important players working to scale these impactful projects in line with the Sustainable Development Goals are our business teams. With each successful project launch, they are the ones to incorporate our impact & sustainability goals into their way of working. That’s why we believe we all have an important role at Glovo in advancing these efforts no matter the department we are in, from the Operations team responsible for electrifying the fleet, the Commercial team in charge of boosting growth of local commerce, to Q-Commerce implementing food surplus reduction plans. 

We know sustainability is not an easy journey and that we will keep facing many obstacles along the way. As we continue on the path of becoming the #1 impact-driven multi-category app, we believe that this step towards positive change is something that will become a standard among businesses and people who need to work in tandem to achieve their goals. As Newton’s 1st law of motion states, a body remains at rest, or in motion at a constant speed in a straight line, unless acted upon by a force – or in our case, impact.