Measure Scope 3 emissions with the help of your suppliers

How to collect Scope 3 data from suppliers

Your Scope 3 inventory should be relevant, complete, consistent, transparent, and accurate. To achieve this quality of data, your suppliers have to be engaged, aligned to your goal, and just as ready for the challenge of Scope 3 as you are.

Our Six-Step Process provides a brilliant framework to make this a reality for you, your brand, and most importantly, your suppliers.

Here’s how it works:

Step 1: Materially Important Issue

Focus on why Scope 3 is important

Why is measuring and reducing Scope 3 important to your brand?

Obtain a true picture of your business' overall environmental footprint
Identify opportunities for improvement
Futureproof your compliance
Protect your brand from reputational risk
Improve suppler relationships

It is crucial that you help suppliers to understand the importance of Scope 3 to your brand - not just what they need to do, but why they need to do it too.

Step 2: SMART Goal

Set realistic and achievable goals

A SMART goal focused on Scope 3 emissions reduction will always take supplier readiness into account, particularly for a bigger project involving your entire supply base.

Understanding how ready your suppliers are to provide emissions data will enable you to:

set more realistic and achievable targets for Scope 3
tailor support and training to their topic maturity

Step 3: Benchmark

Understand your benchmark

A robust Scope 3 emissions initiative demands supplier participation and data accuracy. Our reporting can provide greater visibility to your leadership team of your current benchmark.

From this point it becomes clear where improvements need to be made within your supply base to close the performance gap.

Step 4: Activation

Close the performance gap

In order to get active and engaged suppliers, a key point of focus should be to get them aligned to your Scope 3 goal by running supplier engagement campaigns. Remember to target suppliers based on:

their level of knowledge around sustainability and carbon emissions
their current ability to measure their operational emissions
whether or not they already calculate their own emissions data and can easily provide it to you

Step 5: Data-driven KPI

Grow accountability and transparency

For a Scope 3 emissions initiative to work, you must set clear expectations with suppliers. From there, you can monitor:

how many suppliers have submitted emissions data
current total Scope 3 emissions and reduction
emissions by type and by activity

These metrics can then be shared within the context of their wider KPI within their supplier scorecard.

Step 6: Commercialise

Transform suppliers into your greatest brand asset

Build a name for your brand with customers by translating the reduction in emissions to genuine product claims, marketing, and operational efficiencies.

Success worth sharing

Walmart removes 20 million metric tons of GHGs from its global supply chain

Walmart partnered with Supply Pilot to benchmark supply chain greenhouse gas emissions (GHGs), engage suppliers and inform realistic and achievable goals for their world-renowned "Project Gigaton".

A data collection platform for Scope 3

The Supply Pilot Platform has been built for fast-moving businesses who need to engage and collaborate with hundreds of suppliers to achieve their compliance, sustainability and brand goals.

Measuring Scope 3 emissions - by definition - involves suppliers. This means that a comprehensive supplier engagement strategy is crucial to any successful Scope 3 initiative. This relies upon accurate supplier contacts who have a decent knowledge of the concept and understand exactly what data they need to provide (and why).

Share & succeed at scale

Supplier collaboration

Centralise supplier action plans based on their Scope 3 maturity to maintain accountability and transparency across your supply base.

Manage supply chain emissions accountability at scale
Deliver tailored support around measuring Scope 3 for the supplier cohorts who need it
Set ambitious emissions reductions targets for those who go above and beyond
Maintain supplier clarity of your Scope 3 goal, what actions need to be taken, and set clear deadlines to provide accurate emissions data (rather than estimates)

Scope 3 use case page outlined_Supplier Collaboration - Scope3-1

Target & deploy brand-critical comms

Supplier engagement

Automate supplier contact accuracy management and proactively review email bounces, opens and acknowledgements.

Align and activate suppliers by creating targeted, engaging communications based on current supplier knowledge of carbon emissions and Scope 3.

Run supplier training webinars about how to measure emissions and provide accurate data
Create knowledge-based content articles about the different Scope 3 categories
Share best practice examples of where emissions have been reduced
Centralise supplier queries to identify trends and drive improvement in your supplier knowledgebase.

Turn dozens of data silos into a single view

Supply chain data collection

Collect large volumes of data from suppliers in a way that prioritises supplier experience.

Collect all your emissions data in one place
Bespoke Scope 3 forms which make it quick and simple for suppliers to provide comprehensive emissions data
Enable suppliers to quickly duplicate emissions data for products with pre-populated forms

Scope 3 use case page outlined_Supplier scorecards - Scope 3-2

Scope 3 use case page outlined_Supply chain data collection - Scope 3

Identify champions & build success

Supplier scorecards

Securely share up-to-date performance data and insights with suppliers 24/7 to promote proactivity around Scope 3 and harness more supplier expertise and experience of reducing emissions.

Automatically calculated scorecards enable you to:

Visualise the reduction in emissions for specific suppliers, products, activities, or GHGs
Identify which supply chain activities require specific focus on emissions reduction
Quickly determine how a supplier's performance around Scope 3 emissions relates to other key metrics or initiatives

So much more than a platform

Expert hands-on demand

Supply Pilot's Campaign Team can create Scope 3-specific supplier engagement campaigns to complete this project on your behalf and get all your suppliers to begin (and continue) to provide accurate and complete emissions data.

Overcome resource constraints to meet deadlines: supplier engagement experts take full ownership of delivering on time and above expectation
Tame the complexity to progress: clear facts that give you focus, clarity, and the time you need to meet your goals
Sustain an engaged supply base who are equally invested in your goal

Get results in weeks, not years.

Here’s how we get your Scope 3 supply chain emissions project up and running.

Discovery Call

In your 30-minute discovery call, one of our team will help you unpick and break down the challenge of Scope 3 to create a compelling pilot project. We’re happy to share pricing and timelines at this stage to help you decide whether we’re a good fit for your business.

Supply Pilot Demo

We’ll take you through a full demo of the Supply Pilot Platform within the context of Scope 3, tailored to your specific need. We’ll show you how we use the Platform for each part of the project, and how we’ll help make sure it’s a success. Invite your internal stakeholders to the demo to help bring your pilot project to life. The demo takes 1-2 hours, depending on how many people attend.

Business Case

We’re by your side when it’s time to put your business case forward. If your boss is the visual type, we’ll put together a video. Is your board more interested in the numbers? We’ll arm you with the ROI.

Go-live

Now you’re on board, there’s plenty to do. So why waste time? Expect your kick-off meeting within days of sign-off and your branded platform will be live within a couple of weeks.