Ask most any restaurant operator how many business decisions they typically make each day – from choosing menu specials to organizing staff schedules to resolving a customer service issue – and you’re bound to get a double-digit figure. By contrast, ask those same operators how many times they considered the sustainability or ‘greenness’ of their decisions and you can expect a much smaller number.
Not that there’s anything wrong with that, as Jerry Seinfeld famously said. In fact, the knowledge gleaned by businesses from decades of corporate social responsibility initiatives has demonstrated two things to generally hold true:
For reasons ranging from ignorance to indifference to fear of responsibility, the majority of people resist making ad hoc decisions regarding greener choices.
Should this year bring an “out with the old, in with the new” attitude to your restaurant’s outlook, here are three recommendations to help you to fully realize the sizeable top and bottom-line benefit of more sustainable operations – from customer loyalty to energy savings.
A question of timing
This type of comprehensive ‘rethink’ is prime time to review and evaluate the opportunities to integrate sustainability into the core business policies that will shape, or reshape, daily operations. For example, a novel menu or service strategy could reduce the volume of plates returning to the dishwasher AND boost the opportunity for composting food waste.
However, to stimulate out-of-the-box thinking that offers the best chance for more efficient and greener operations, it’s also important to address the number one issue mentioned earlier. For that, you may need a larger meeting table.
Collaborative process
This approach, though often demanding an above-average level of facilitation, can lead to the kind of innovation that pays off handsomely across the board. Last year, a restaurant renovation project in Vancouver took this process a large step further. Dubbed ‘The Next Course’ and facilitated by BC Hydro’s Technical Innovation Group, it brought stakeholder partners, including the provincial government’s LiveSmartBC program and the Green Table Network to the redesign table for O’Doul’s Restaurant & Bar, a Robson Street fixture which recently reopened as Forage (foragevancouver.com)
Joint project success
However, with that many ‘cooks’ involved, the members of the project documented the entire process to show how good, and better decisions were made and, they hope to produce a template that other operators can follow to achieve similar results.
For example, to prioritize selection of the ENERGY STAR-rated and other high-efficiency equipment, lighting and ventilation systems, project partner Don Fisher of the California-based Food Service Technology Center provided ample evidence that “simple payback is never that simple,” and “recouping premium costs from energy savings is now far from the only factor that matters. Reliability, versatility and control enhanced by state-of-the-art technologies go hand-in-hand with energy efficiency.”
Combined knowledge
- Purchasing local versus commodity products;
- Choosing sustainable materials and building techniques; and
- Fresh policies for staff operations that will help ensure green employee habits, such as conserving energy, reducing waste and boosting recycling.
Another outcome of the collaborative process reinforces these good behaviours: Redesigning kitchen prep stations and location of multiple bins in service areas and bussing areas, etc.
Maximizing resources
Go big and go green in 2013. Enjoy the journey and its rewards.
About the author
André LaRivière is an independent sustainable foodservice facilitator/consultant based in Vancouver and founder of the Green Table Network. To watch the video chronicles of The Next Course project, go to thenextcourse.ca.
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