Barista Magazine

OCT-NOV 2012

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Several council members recalled the great work that Henninger has achieved through the GCN, and we reached out to her for guidance. Together with Henninger and the Food Service Technology Center, the SCAA Sustainability Council worked to create an impactful and accessible tool. We determined we could deliver on the membership's request for more sustainable best practice through the creation of a series of handbooks, the Green Guide, designed for coffee retailers. Over the course of the next several months we worked closely with the GCN and the Food Service Technology Center toward defining guidelines to produce a set of best practices that could aspire to meet the needs of the specialty coffee community—emphasis on specialty there. One of the most important considerations for us was that we could only extol the virtues of practices that would absolutely not compromise quality for anyone who implements them. An impactful concept as we worked through the creation of the guide all along was the notion of community and collaborative efforts. The old adage that together we can do more is so true. As we worked on the project, we rallied behind the belief that most everyone wants to do good by their practices, and that together as an industry we can have such an important impact and really lead the charge where responsible behaviors are concerned. One of our favorite factoids through this endeavor was this factoids from the Green Guide: If each café in North America replaced just one incandescent light bulb with a compact florescent or LED bulb it would result in emissions reduction equivalent to removing about 700 cars from the roads. If enough of us commit to the effort, the results can be staggering! By design, this multimodule digital tool is meant to empower café operators to ease into reducing the negative impact imparted by café operations. It is meant to lead us down an ever-widening path toward responsibility in business (and in fact, many of its suggested practices play well in our own homes). The Guide illustrates good, sound and easy-to-implement ideas that will help coffee retailers to consume less energy and save money. For example, we know that energy costs are on the rise, and they are important motivating factors for business owners. Speaking to some of the specifics, the April 2012 edition of the Specialty Coffee Chronicle notes that this year U.S. electricity prices are expected to average 10.48 cents per kilowatt hour, a 1.1 percent increase from 2011. And natural gas is expected to average $9.21 per thousand cubic feet in Saving ENERGY: I know everyone has THERE ARE A BUNCH of easy changes a café operator can take to lower the business's impacts. In no particular order, here are some of my favorite "low-hanging fruits" to start out with: heard this one a million times, but I can't emphasize it enough: Change your light bulbs! Replacing lamps (bulbs) with high- efficiency lighting is super easy and saves cash quickly, as the investment usually pays back within a year (depending on the lights, of course). Advances in efficient lighting have been great and prices continue to drop as the technology improves. There's a ton of great info about this in the first module of the Green Guide. Reducing WASTE: You just need to analyze all of the waste associated with the products you bring into the café and the waste that your café throws out. Call your waste hauler or city department of the environment to see if there are any financial incentives provided by your city or county to help small businesses recycle and/or compost in order to divert more of their waste from the landfill. This varies greatly among municipalities, but it's worth investigating to see if recycling more can save you money. Even if there's no incentive, it's an easy thing to do, and it matters a 2012, a 2.2 percent increase over 2011. Thankfully, Energy Star estimates that restaurants (including cafés) can save five to 15 percent on monthly utility expenses by implementing just a few changes. The Green Guide will be released this month for $24.99. "Our goal with this program is really to encourage as many participating retailers as possible to create the largest positive impact, so for us, keeping the price point accessible was key," says Tara Shenson of the SCAA. The Green Guide will only be available digitally, via PDF or as e-book files, and all file types will be sold at scaa.org/store. Since measurement is a critical component to ensuring our efforts are successful, each SCAA retailer member who purchases the Green Guide will receive a one-year complimentary subscription to the energy edition of START, a powerful online database that allows retailers to input data related to their business and discover the impact of their efforts. Non-members will also receive discounted pricing for their first year. This tool will not only track your own progress, but populating the system with industry data will begin to inform us just how big an impact we can have collectively. And the more compelling that is, the more motivating it will be. lot to customers to know you're recycling everything possible that's accepted by the haulers in your area. Conserving WATER: Easy ways to conserve water are to install aerators on your faucets (they cost a few bucks at the hardware store), and to post signs at sinks in the kitchen and bathroom to remind staff and customers to conserve water. Purchasing Practices: To reduce waste, look at all of the products you order and ask yourself if there's any way to cut down or reuse the packaging, such as cardboard boxes, plastic wrap, plastic bags, etc. Most venders are happy to work with you to reduce packaging if you tell them you're making a big effort to reduce waste. Also, try to purchase products that are produced locally as much as possible. This is not only more sustainable from a carbon footprint aspect by reducing transportation involved, but it also helps support your local economy! —Kirstin Henninger, Green Café Network www.baristamagazine.com 73

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