Putting sustainability at the top of the menu
Environment and plastics
Sunny Chinna, Owner of The Fat Pizza comes from a family of takeaway business owners and understands the importance of staying up to date with what’s happening in the sector, keeping the business relevant, and listening to what customers are asking for.
Increasingly that involves thinking differently about the environment and plastics.
Sunny’s interest in sustainability started at university, where one of his modules looked at the connection between the environment and business.
He has kept this in mind ever since, and we can see that today in The Fat Pizza’s drive to reduce the businesses’ use of single-use plastics. The Southend takeaway was the first in the UK to ditch plastic sauce sachets and trial ones made from seaweed as part of a Just Eat initiative.
An alternative to the traditional plastic packaging, these sachets are compostable, biodegradable and decompose in approximately six weeks. This was a massive step in the fight to reduce single-use plastics. In just six weeks Sunny sent out 6,000 seaweed-based sauce sachets. He then took part in a second trial which rolled out across ten restaurants in London.
Together they stopped 40,000 plastic sachets entering London homes.
Healthier customers
The Fat Pizza is always looking at ways to update its menu as many customers are now looking for healthier options. So the Fat Pizza offers veggie smoothies, and pizzas with 50% less cheese as an option. Sunny keeps an eye on what’s in each pizza – they make their own pizza dough and tomato sauce in the kitchen so they can control the levels of sugar and salt being used.
Happier staff
To run a business successfully, Sunny believes it’s important to focus on your staff and build a positive culture. As part of this, he is encouraging his staff to be more environmentally-friendly by providing them with a training manual and offering reusable drinks flasks.
Helping the Community
Sunny has also established close links to a local organisation in Southend called Homeless Eats. The organisation offers support to homeless people by supplying hot food donated by local restaurants and served from street food stalls or vans. Sunny has supported the initiative by donating freshly made pizzas to those in need of a hot meal. Sunny tells us it has been an eye-opening experience for The Fat Pizza team as it has increased awareness and has driven his staff to do more community work. Sunny is now in talks with Homeless Eats to see how they can collaborate on new initiatives.
Sharing best practice
As well as keeping his customers updated on The Fat Pizza’s work, Sunny is also a keen believer in sharing best practice with others in the industry. He is now setting up his own takeaway consultancy called the “Takeaway Doctor” to help other takeaways become more sustainable and environmentally friendly.
Energy, electricity and the environment
Being energy smart in the kitchen is a win-win. The Fat Pizza is using super-efficient ovens which have low levels of heat loss; fridge screens to prevent cold air escaping, and LED lights. Sunny uses Eskuta electric bikes (over 30% discount when ordered through Just Eat) to reduce emission levels when making deliveries, as well as AI automated dispatch to drivers, which not only reduces drive time and CO2 emissions but uses less petrol too.
Just Eat offer special deals for Restaurant Partners on green energy, so why not get in touch to learn more.
Sunny’s top tips for making change
- Happier staff, lower turnover
- Great marketing potential when doing something interesting in your local community
- Reducing food waste and saving energy = Save on costs!
- Happy customers > customer retention > new customers
The SRA and Just Eat can provide practical information to all restaurants interested in becoming more environmentally friendly.
To learn more about the SRA’s resources, events, online community where you can share, inspire and learn get in touch at [email protected]