How much energy weighs on retail EBIT

Two numbers from the same source

When you bring an energy efficiency project into a management meeting, the first objection is almost always the same: energy is 1.9 per cent of sales, that is not where the P&L is decided. It is only half true. Energy really is a small line on revenue, but revenue is not the number a food retail chain is measured on: the number is the margin, and the margin is thin.

The two figures you need come from the same source, the same year and the same perimeter, and that is not a detail: pairing the energy share of one sample with the margin of another produces a ratio that means nothing.

Indicator	Value	Perimeter
Energy costs as a share of sales	1.9%	Italian food retail, 2024
Sector EBIT margin	2.7%	same sample, same year
Energy as a share of EBIT	70%	1.9 divided by 2.7

The source is the Area Studi Mediobanca observatory on Italian food retail, 2026 edition on 2024 data: 118 sets of accounts, 95.8 per cent of the Italian market. It is not a sector estimate, it is the sum of filed financial statements.

There is an independent cross-check, and it comes from a single operator: in Esselunga’s 2025 consolidated financial statements, utilities account for 1.82 per cent of sales. A different number because the perimeter is different, the same order of magnitude.

What a cut in the bill is worth on EBIT

From here on it is arithmetic. A 10 per cent cut on a line worth 1.9 per cent of sales frees up 0.19 points of revenue. Those 0.19 points carry no associated variable costs: they are not additional revenue to be produced, they are spending that stops going out, so they land in full on the margin. On an EBIT margin of 2.7 points, 0.19 points are worth 7.0 per cent of EBIT.

Cut in the bill	Saving on revenue	EBIT growth
−5%	0.10 points	+3.5%
−10%	0.19 points	+7.0%
−15%	0.29 points	+10.6%
−20%	0.38 points	+14.1%
−35%	0.67 points	+24.6%

The percentages in the first column are scenarios, not guaranteed results. How much you can actually cut depends on the equipment, the opening hours, the starting point and how much has already been done. The ratio between the columns, on the other hand, is not a scenario: it is arithmetic on sector data, and it holds whatever cut you manage to achieve.

There is one rule worth taking into the meeting: every percentage point cut off the bill is worth 0.7 per cent more EBIT.

One euro of energy is worth thirty-seven euros of revenue

The same ratio can be turned around, and that is usually the form that convinces the person across the table. To raise EBIT as much as one euro of energy saved raises it, you would need roughly 37 euros of additional revenue at the same margin.

The concept is the one the EPA has used for years in the ENERGY STAR programme under the name of equivalent revenue. The multiplier, however, is not the American one: it is recalculated on Italian margins, because the margin is what determines it. The thinner the margin, the higher the multiplier, and Italian food distribution has one of the thinnest margins among the sectors we work in.

Where a store’s energy goes

Knowing how much energy weighs does not yet tell you where to act. For that you need the consumption breakdown, and in Italy one exists: it comes from 309 real energy audits of stores, collected by ENEA together with Federdistribuzione.

End use	Share of electricity consumption
Refrigeration	40.5%
Lighting	18.0%
Other	15.9%
Space conditioning	15.5%
Food processing	10.1%

Two lines out of five are cooling. Refrigeration and space conditioning together account for 56 per cent of electricity consumption, and they are also the two lines that respond to hourly control: you can change when they run and at what setpoint, without touching the equipment.

The independent European cross-check confirms the order of magnitude: the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre puts refrigeration above 50 per cent and lighting above 25 per cent of a food store’s consumption.

Why you will not find an Italian kWh per square metre

That is the question that comes next: what is the reference specific consumption for an Italian supermarket? The honest answer is that no representative figure exists, and it is worth explaining why rather than quoting one borrowed from elsewhere.

Stores are numerous and each one has modest unit consumption: as a rule they fall outside the energy audit obligation, so the ENEA database does not hold a representative sample of them. The intensities in circulation come from other countries, with different climates, formats and opening hours, and using them as a yardstick for an Italian chain leads to wrong conclusions.

The percentage breakdown, on the other hand, exists and is measured across 309 audits. It is the most solid figure available, and it is also the more useful one: it says where to look, which is the real question.

What this turns into

Refrigeration and space conditioning are 56 per cent of a store’s electricity consumption. On those two lines you act on setpoints and schedules, not on the machines: no equipment replacement, no store closure, no building work.

The method is the one we use on every chain we run. The sensors are wireless and install without any preparatory work. The control does not chase the current temperature, it anticipates the forecast load, hour by hour: that is what lowers production peaks and makes the saving structural rather than occasional.

Across a store estate the arithmetic closes the way it opened. Every percentage point cut off the bill is worth 0.7 per cent more EBIT, and the bill is cut where the energy goes.