QSR magazine published an article recently about new take out packaging for restaurants made from recycled plastic water bottles. Dubbed The Bottle Box, the restaurants that have used it say it performs just as well or better than normal plastic take out packaging, and that it can be customized with …
Read More »The Trials Of Going Green: Tundra Revamps Its Waste Management System
When Tundra discovered that a waste management snafu had resulted in office recycling bins getting thrown in the trash early this year, we decided a complete waste management audit was needed, and fast. The lessons we’ve learned in the past three months have been both illuminating and hard won, and …
Read More »Green Restaurants: Turning Food Waste Into Electricity
San Francisco restaurants are often on the cutting edge of sustainability and green practices. They’ve pioneered ways to turn food waste into fertilizer, reduce food miles by sourcing locally, and decrease waste through recycling and composting. More recently, the East Bay Municipal Utility District has started converting up to 200 …
Read More »How To Source Food Locally: A Business Guide To Success
Local food. It sounds great on paper, and it may even be the thing restaurant patrons claim they care about most. But the reality is that restaurants are businesses, and the restaurant business is one of the toughest gigs out there. Sounding good isn’t going to be enough to justify …
Read More »How A Low Flow Valve Can Improve Your Cash Flow (AND Green Cred)
Your restaurant uses a lot of water. Between the water you serve your guests, the ice machine, the dish machine, and the sink, any restaurant goes through a lot of water on a daily basis. I don’t have to tell you how much that water costs you. I’m sure you’re …
Read More »Which Energy Efficiency Upgrades Are The Best Investment?
Let’s face it—restaurants are energy hogs. According to the National Restaurant Association, restaurants use five times more energy per square foot than other types of commercial buildings. And of the energy that restaurants use, the kitchen uses five times more than the rest of the building. Energy costs, on average, …
Read More »The Green Restaurant Association: Sustainable Knowledge Is Power
When Michael Oshman started the Green Restaurant Association (GRA) in 1990, hardly anybody in the food service industry thought much about sustainability. “The green business movement wasn’t something that really existed,” he says. “We were one of the first organizations that wanted to help businesses. We asked: ‘What if we …
Read More »Your Restaurant’s Guide To Commercial Composting
Every to go container, every disposable cup, and every plastic fork your restaurant uses ends up in a landfill somewhere. Over the course of a year that adds up to millions of tons of trash from all the restaurants in the United States. For most restaurants, these disposable items are …
Read More »Ten Cheap Ways To Increase Restaurant Efficiency (AND Profits!)
1. Start-up, Shutdown Schedules Not everything needs to be turned on right away when the first cook arrives. Equipment start-up schedules similar to just-in-time ordering saves energy with no investment. 2. Low flow aerators These are potentially one of the lowest priced efficiency measures a restaurant can buy. Aerators range …
Read More »Is Your Recycling Program Really Working?
We’ve talked before on The Back Burner about the importance of greening your restaurant operation for two reasons: because customers appreciate it (and are beginning to expect it) and because frequently green practices mean cost savings. Unfortunately recycling is not a practice that usually saves your operation money. It is, …
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