How PALM centralizes their ESG Data with Sunhats Collaborative Proof Platform

The Situation

Sustainability at PALM

Sustainability is firmly anchored in PALM's corporate strategy: ecology, social responsibility, and good corporate governance are the guiding principles for its actions. PALM is consistently committed to recycling - all paper, corrugated base paper, and graphic paper is made from 100% recycled paper and is fully recyclable.

The company is committed to the principles of the UN Global Compact, complies with international labor standards, and considers transparency, social responsibility, and stakeholder dialogue to be integral parts of its strategy. PALM regularly publishes a sustainability report in which measures and progress along the ESG dimensions are disclosed. PALM also discloses data to interested customers at CDP.
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The Challenge

Management of ESG data and customer inquiries in an international company

PALM faced the challenge of efficiently collecting and structuring sustainability data across numerous independent locations and making it available for external inquiries. As an internationally active group of companies with almost 35 production sites in the paper, packaging, and recycling sectors, the effort required to respond to questionnaires is constantly increasing - especially in connection with EcoVadis, CDP, and individual customer requirements.

Until now, these requests were handled decentrally by the quality management teams at the individual locations, often involving a high level of manual effort and recurring coordination loops. There was no uniform, centrally accessible database for ESG proof.

International expansion - most recently through the acquisition of five locations in France, Spain, and Portugal - is further increasing complexity. PALM recognized the need to centrally bundle ESG data, customer requirements, and documentation in order to create synergies between the individual PALM companies and sustainably reduce the burden on processes.

The central question was: How can cooperation between sales, quality management, and the sustainability team be structured in such a way that customer inquiries can be answered quickly, consistently, and based on data - while at the same time regulatory pressure is growing and transparency requirements along the supply chain are increasing?

The Solution

The Sunhat Moment

With the introduction of Sunhat, PALM has taken a decisive step toward digitizing and harmonizing sustainability and ESG data across all locations. This has strengthened exchange and collaboration between locations and made knowledge centrally accessible. PALM now benefits from clear processes, uniform data structures, and greater transparency, particularly with regard to the coordination of EcoVadis assessments.

Today, nearly 20 companies in the Palm Group already use their own workspaces in Sunhat, including the five newly added Palm Packaging companies from France, Spain, and Portugal.

All relevant ESG information is structured, reviewed, and made available for internal and external requirements via the platform.

Particularly valuable for PALM:

• Collaboration and knowledge sharing: Sunhat strengthens these aspects, particularly in the context of EcoVadis assessments.
• Central data maintenance and Proof Management: ensures consistent information and significantly reduces queries.
• Automated Proof Management: ensures that all information is documented in a verifiable and traceable manner.
• Sales Portal: in the future, this will facilitate direct communication with customers.

In addition to the EcoVadis assessments, PALM also uses Sunhat to respond to the CDP questionnaire and for internal knowledge sharing in the context of sustainability. The platform has thus become a connecting element within the group of companies - a central building block for greater transparency, efficiency, and collaboration.

“If I had been alone in answering the EcoVadis questionnaire - without Sunhat - I might have scored one or two points more. Sunhat was a great help - after all, we received 12 additional points.”

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Jürgen Reitter, Head of QM

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The Results

Greater Transparency, better Collaboration, measurable Progress

By introducing Sunhat, PALM was able to build a central database for all ESG-related information - across locations, countries, and business areas. The platform not only facilitated collaboration between quality management, sales, and sustainability teams, but also significantly improved response times and data quality for customer inquiries.

The Result:

• EcoVadis improvements between 8 and 22 points: Through structured data collection, clearly documented evidence, and consistent responses, several companies were able to significantly increase their EcoVadis rating.
  
• Less coordination effort for quality management: Sales teams can respond to customer inquiries directly via Sunhat. The relevant ESG data and proof are available centrally.
• Stronger collaboration between locations: Uniform processes and workspaces promote exchange and create synergies within the entire Palm Group.
  
• Future-proof ESG structure: With Sunhat, PALM is optimally prepared to respond flexibly to new requirements and reporting standards, such as CSRD.

This not only enables PALM to master the existing challenges of processing customer requirements, but also lays the foundation for group-wide ESG digitalization that combines transparency, efficiency, and sustainability.