Many foodservice providers have struggled with the responsible buying/green agenda for a while now, but clients and customers are getting tired of hollow words and unsubstantiated promises: they want to see a strategy, they want action and they want to see results. Operators are in a strong position to distinguish themselves from their competition by proving their buying activity is responsible and that they take green issues seriously.
Acquire's commercial director Ed Bevan, said: "Sourcing goods and services responsibly has become increasingly important to the organisations we work for, their clients and most importantly their customers.
"But no two foodservice organisations are the same," continued Ed. “Their buying profiles, their food offers and, above all, their customers will be diverse. So, we have developed a flexible framework that will give any operator the opportunity to re-shape their buying activity - whatever their interpretation of the green agenda might be.”
Green10 involves every aspect of the supply chain and product selection. In consultation with its clients and operational staff, Acquire identified and defined '10 Pillars of Responsibility'. The pillars may be singled out or used in any combination to reflect an individual food service organisation's buying strategy and help measure progress in meeting any targets set to bring about improvement.
The pillars cover every aspect of what is an extremely complex challenge - sourcing, buying, using and disposing of food responsibly, with an appropriate level of concern for the environment as well as the end user's satisfaction and enjoyment. The 10 pillars comprise Food Mileage, Local Sourcing, Environmental Profile, Seasonality, Renewable, Culture, Animal Welfare, Wellbeing, Packaging and Food Waste.
Each pillar has been clearly defined to reflect Acquire's understanding of the issues involved. Roy Farrier, executive director at Acquire added: "We realise that multiple interpretations of the pillars will exist within the foodservice sector; Green10 is governed entirely by the definitions we have developed. It's by picking and choosing which pillars to concentrate on that individual businesses can shape their own policies according to their priorities and their definition of what being 'green' means to them.
"Alongside each pillar we have defined the metric by which operational/financial performance may be measured," explained Roy. "By establishing a start/base position, organisations embracing this initiative are able to accurately measure their progress against the goals they have agreed within their business.
"It's likely that every organisation will focus solely upon the pillars that reflect their policies, strategies and CSR goals and so it follows that the shape of each client's responsible sourcing initiative will be unique. Green10 may represent a starting point, a halfway house or perhaps even an end game for some food service organisations."
Acquire recommends epsys - the leading online procurement platform - as its preferred e-trading partner and many of the Green10 metrics are captured in real time through each client's unique e-trading history across their entire estate.
For any organisations that do adopt Green10 Acquire has produced a series of posters to promote the initiative to employees in order to encourage involvement and buy-in at every level.
Ed said: ”We understand that foodservice providers will focus upon their own combination of pillars. It's our job is to help those providers shape their approach to responsible sourcing and provide the means by which progress can be accurately measured."
Green10 is a framework that can help any food service organisation shape their responsible buying strategy and operators interested in learning more about how Green10 could help them make a difference should visit www.greenten.co.uk