Circular Canvas applied to Nouvelle Attitude and La Poste
We have seen the potential of the Circular Canvas in analysing the business models of firms, but what about its application in project management? We’ve chosen to use the example of La Poste and its Nouvelle Attitude partner to illustrate the way in which the Circular Canvas can be used to assess a firm, to uncover opportunities, and to prepare new projects within a company. The Groupe La Poste, which is France’s national postal service company, has a variety of missions and activities, so for the sake of clarity we’ll only be focusing on its postal service arm in France.

La Poste Circular Canvas early 2010s
The mission
“Serve the French people six days a week, to ensure post and parcels are collected and delivered throughout the country”
Key activities
Collection, sorting, transport and delivery of letters & parcels ⇒ Linear supply chain
Partners
Unions, vehicle wholesalers, maintenance network, insurers, intermediary transporters (aircraft carriers, trains), human resources, inclusivity hiring actors
- impacts
- Positive – connecting individuals, helping businesses deliver products to customers, employing workers with lower work opportunities (unemployed for a long time, disabled people), strong commitment to gender equality
- Negative – pollution resulting from transport, paperwork & paper waste resulting from sorting
- revenues/costs
- Revenues from clients, per delivery
- Costs associated with labour, insurance, fuel consumption, real estate (fulfillment centers, shops)
Resources
Natural resources – Wood (paper, cardboard), fuel (fossil and electric), steel & concrete (buildings), glass (buildings)
Technical resources – Vehicle fleet, sorting lines, warehouses, CRM software
Energy resources – Energy to power vehicles, sorting facilities which sort & store letters and parcels, and to power call centers & databases
- impacts
- Positive – smooth organization and communication (sorting lines, warehouses CRM), delivering on its mission to provide universal postal service (human resources, vehicle fleet), company is already factoring in product life-cycle impacts right from the product design phase, its business players in the same area work together to optimise flows and trade or pool raw materials or waste
- Negative – pollution from fuel consumption & sourcing, pollution from energy consumption
- revenues/costs – all those resources are priced at market values and none of them generate actual revenues for La Poste, except the human capital (possibility to attract new clients) and the CRM software (reduces drastically the energy and time consumed in communications)
Value proposition
Delivering parcels and letters in the fastest and least expensive way possible
Users and context
Individuals (sending personal letters and packages to other individuals/ sending document forms to institutions), businesses (shipping goods directly to consumers), institutions (serving documents to individuals – notices, subpoenas, certificates, etc.)
- impacts
- Positive – helping the complex and interconnected modern society function, creating jobs
- Negative – encouraging the usage of virgin paper & cardboard
- revenues/costs
- Diversified revenues stream due to the three different user segments and the variety of operations involved
- Costs from transportation, storage and labour
Next use
No next use of materials from envelopes, boxes, etc.
Distribution
Own distribution system + logistics partners
- Impacts
- Positive – no positive impact
- Negative – production of waste + pollution from distribution already mentioned
- Revenues/costs
- High costs – paying workers taking care of delivery, shipping costs
- Revenues – as distribution is at the heart of what La Poste is doing, their main revenue is generated from there
Analysis
La Poste’s 2010s business model needs to be analyzed in the context of the time. La Poste identified two challenges which were likely to impact its operations :
- The environment and energy transition : in the wake of increasing global warming, growing scarcity of non-renewable resources, and the depletion of our natural ecosystems, french people are now expecting businesses to also provide positive environmental impact, while mitigating for their negative one.
- Social inclusion : in the beginning of the 21st century, and especially after the 2008 financial crisis, social exclusion was rising and hitting increasingly diverse subsections of the population. Businesses are now also expected to deliver social value, and contribute to building a more equal society.
The various stakeholders of La Poste – key accounts, local authorities, the State, customers, staff, consumers… – expect the Group to respond to those growing environmental and social trends. Due to its sheer size and the key service the company delivers to the French population, it is duty-bound to become a leader when it comes to integrating environmental and social impact in its overall strategy. Making a profit will have to go hand in hand with maintaining jobs, protecting the environment and satisfying employees and customers.
To address the challenges raised by sustainability issues, the Group will have to:
- exploit the full potential of its current logistics
- rethink the way it services city centres;
- improve the efficiency of its waste management processes
- building a more inclusive workforce
As you can tell from the company’s 2010s Circular Canvas, La Poste follows a highly linear business model. The French Postal Service mission centers around bringing one element from one place to another. Plotting the company’s business model enables us to highlight the issue of paper and cardboard waste. The big question then becomes : How can La Poste transform this challenge into an opportunity? How can the solution designed by La Poste both provide positive environmental and social impact?
Noticing that paper was highly used in its operations, La Poste managed to turn this issue into an opportunity, and enter the paper recycling market. La Poste decided to partner with Nouvelle Attitude to use its current logistics network to better integrate circularity in its business model. The following Circular Canvas details the business model of La Poste following its acquisition of Nouvelle Attitude.
La Poste’s Circular Canvas following the acquisition of Nouvelle Attitude
The mission
Bringing regions closer together and supporting environmental transitions through our activity of delivering parcels and letters
Key activities
Collection, sorting and recycling of paper to be then delivered to factories using recycled fiber
Partners
Local employment centers, factories using recycled fiber, unions, vehicle wholesalers, maintenance network, insurers, intermediary transporters (aircraft carriers, trains), human resources, inclusivity hiring actors (Pôle Emploi…)
- Impacts
- positive – recycling and reusing paper thus reducing waste; providing more raw materials for factories using recycled fiber, hiring workers from disadvantaged employment groups (either unemployed for a long time, asylum seekers…)
- negative – pollution from transport
- Revenues/costs
- Revenues from selling recycled paper to factories
- Costs associated with labour, machinery, warehousing and transport (to be noted the last two were already part of La Poste’s operations) -> but leveraging the current logistical network of La Poste helps decreasing costs
Resources
Natural resources – metals (machinery), steel & concrete (facilities), human resources
Technical resources – machinery, transport vehicles
Energy resources – energy needs for facilities and transport (last one already part of La Poste’s operations), reducing and compensating for 100% of emissions
- Impacts
- Positive – sharing some energy resources with the existing structures of La Poste
- Negative – pollution from sourcing of materials, pollution from transport
- Revenues/costs – all the resources consume cash
Value proposition
Offering factories a cheap and reliable source of recycled fiber while helping boost employment of unskilled workers & offering a paper-waste management service to companies on top of its current delivery service
Users and context
Diverse range of end purposes, but all users are industrial customers
- Impacts
- Positive – helping industries source more responsibly, rising employment in the social environments, getting employees to recycle at work
- Negative – no negative impacts
- Revenues/costs
- Revenues from industrial consumers for providing raw materials
- Costs incurred from labour and labour training
Next use
Once La Poste collects business paper and cardboard waste, it brings them to recycling factories such that the paper can be given a “second life”. The recycled fiber, after being turned into a new recyclable product, can be once again recycled for up to 7 times.
Distribution
Own distribution system shared with other branches of La Poste + preexisting logistics partners
- Impacts
- Positive – no need to set up new logistics, “ride-sharing” of materials alongside letters and packages
- Negative – GHG emissions from existing transportation, but adding the recycling offering does not increase significantly those emissions
- Revenues/costs
- Costs of delivering used papers to recycled factories
- Synergies in cost-sharing
The updated version of the Circular Canvas shows that La Poste was not only able to tackle a considerable environmental challenge, but also that by leveraging its current logistics network, it managed to create a new avenue for revenues.
Read more about the Circular Canvas
- Sustainable business model Canvas
- Circular Canvas
- About us
- Sustainability analysis of a company
- Redesigning a company business model
- Get students and entrepreneurs to build sustainable business model
- Why adopt the Circular Canvas instead of the Business Model Canvas
- Circular Canvas applied to Nouvelle Attitude and La Poste
- Sustainability screening for Lime electric scooters
- Introduction to the Circular Canvas – Making sense of each Circular Canvas category
- Rethinking and redesigning a company’s business model to better integrate Circularity and Sustainability