Bankside businesses start on their food sustainability journey

Better Bankside joined forces with Klimato and Otolo to run an interactive and in person workshop, offering coaching to hospitality businesses who wanted to start on their sustainability journey.

With roughly one third of all greenhouse gas emissions stemming from the food industry, it is one of the single largest contributors to climate change. Klimato is a start-up with the mission to reduce the climate impact from food by offering a tool for calculating, communicating and reporting the carbon footprint per dish. Their carbon labelling educates and encourages chefs and restaurant guests to make climate-friendly choices, which coupled with a reporting function makes it easy to set goals, reduce food-related emissions and track progress to combat climate change – one meal at a time.

Otolo champions and uplifts the hospitality industry. Their mission is to serve those working in hospitality who want to see how far they can develop themselves and inspire others to do the same. They run hospitality mentoring programmes, courses that focus on the individual and exciting events.

During the session, businesses were guided through the carbon footprint of different regularly used ingredients and advised on practical and proven food swaps. Together we looked at the challenges and resistance to change businesses faced both internally and from customers, and discussed how businesses could empower their customers to be more sustainable.

Some key takeaways from the day included:

• Country of origin and production method of an ingredient has a bigger impact than food miles
• Opportunity to gain customers through carbon labels and transparency. According to a recent Deloitte study, 48% of people want to be more sustainable but don’t know how to be
• Tweaking menu design to encourage consumer behaviour towards more climate-friendly options

See more photos and feedback from the masterclass.

“We are passionate about sharing what we know with the hospitality industry. Equipping businesses with the information to reduce the carbon footprint of their menu and how to communicate this with their customers is what we love doing. The discussions were thought-provoking and it was great to hear everyone’s key learning at the end and how they will implement these tips in their day to day business.”
Missie Low, Partnerships & Business Development Manager, Klimato

The first in our series of events to support the hospitality industry. If there are any topics you would like to learn more about, please email Emma Charter, Marketing Manager.