The honest starting point
Most hospitality businesses we work with are doing more on sustainability than they realise. Seasonal menus. Responsible sourcing. Above Living Wage pay. Food waste separation. LED lighting. A chef who cares deeply about where ingredients come from.
The problem is not a lack of action. The problem is that none of it is structured, measured or communicated in a way that means anything to a guest, an investor, a corporate client or a certification body. That is the gap we are usually trying to close. Not start doing sustainability — but organise what you already do, measure it properly, and build from there.
Why hospitality is different from most sectors
Sustainability in hospitality is genuinely complex in ways that generic frameworks do not always account for. Your biggest environmental impact is almost certainly in your supply chain – the farming systems behind your ingredients, the fishing methods behind your seafood, the land use decisions of your producers. That is also where you have the least direct control.
At the same time, the things you can control – energy use, food waste, packaging, workforce practices – are highly operational and vary site by site. What works in one kitchen does not always transfer to another.
And your customer-facing communications have to thread a difficult needle: specific enough to be credible, accessible enough that someone reading a menu actually engages with it. So the question is not just what should we do – it is where do we start, given everything else we are running.
The four areas that matter most
Sourcing is almost always the highest-impact and highest-credibility area for a food business. What you buy and where it comes from shapes your environmental footprint, your relationship with producers, and your story. If you are already working with suppliers whose farming practices you respect, documenting that relationship and articulating it clearly is a significant commercial asset. Regenerative farming, MSC-certified seafood, seasonal and local sourcing — these resonate with guests, journalists and awards judges in ways that generic sustainability statements do not.
Food waste is the area with the clearest operational return. Food thrown away is money thrown away. Most hospitality businesses have a rough sense of waste levels but no structured measurement. Starting with simple tracking – by category, by site, reviewed monthly – typically reveals reduction opportunities quickly. Beyond the financial benefit, waste measurement is increasingly expected by investors and forms a core part of frameworks like the SRA Food Made Good Standard.
Energy and carbon is where most businesses feel most out of their depth, but where the starting point is simpler than it looks. If you have energy bills, you have the data for a basic Scope 1 and 2 carbon calculation. That baseline is all you need to begin. It lets you set a reduction target, track improvement year on year, and respond credibly when investors or corporate clients ask about your climate commitments.
Workforce is often the most underrated sustainability story in hospitality. The industry has a well-known retention problem. Businesses that invest seriously in training, progression, wellbeing and fair pay are genuinely different — and that difference shows up in talent attraction, in service quality and in brand reputation. Tracking turnover, training hours and internal promotion rates gives you the data to tell that story.
Which accreditations are actually worth pursuing
The certification landscape for hospitality is confusing, so here is a straightforward way to think about it.
SRA Food Made Good is the most relevant certification for restaurant businesses. Designed specifically for hospitality, recognised across the sector, it feeds into major awards and the assessment process is itself a useful diagnostic. It is where we would start for most operators.
B Corp is the gold standard for holistic ESG credibility but a significantly larger undertaking – typically 12 to 18 months and meaningful resource commitment. It makes sense as a medium-term goal once foundational measurement and governance are in place.
Living Wage Employer Accreditation is low cost, fast to achieve and increasingly expected. If you are already paying at or above the real Living Wage, formalising it is a straightforward win.
WRAP Guardians of Grub is a free commitment framework for food waste. Low barrier to entry, credible with investors and a good discipline for building measurement habits.
Turning it into something that works commercially
The hospitality businesses that use sustainability most effectively commercially are not necessarily the most advanced. They are the ones who have made it visible, honest and consistent.
That means a clear, specific section on your website – not vague values statements, but actual practices, actual numbers, actual commitments. It means giving your front-of-house teams the language to talk confidently about sourcing and practices. And it means using social media for honest progress updates rather than aspirational positioning.
Be willing to say: here is where we are, here is what we are working on, and here is how we will know if we are improving. That transparency is more powerful than polished claims. Guests, investors and corporate clients are good at spotting the difference.
The opportunity right now is that the bar in hospitality is not that high. Most operators are doing very little formally. Businesses that structure their approach, measure what they do and communicate it clearly stand out significantly — not because they have done something extraordinary, but because they have done something deliberate.
Ready to take the next step?
If any of this sounds familiar, it is probably worth a conversation. We work with businesses at all stages of the sustainability journey – from those just starting out to those looking to go deeper. No hard sell, no jargon. Just a straightforward chat about where you are and what might actually help.
Get in touch at [email protected] or visit www.sustainablex.co.uk