A sustainable future for food service means flavorful food that’s healthy and economically viable for all, produced through practices that respect farmers, workers, and animals; nourish the community; and replenish our shared natural resources for future generations.
—Bon Appétit Management Company’s definition of sustainability
Our path toward greater social responsibility and sustainability started as a quest for flavor. When you cook from scratch, you want the freshest ingredients. That led us to launch our Farm to Fork program back in 1999, long before local food became the phenomenon it is today. Working directly with farmers and ranchers opened our eyes to the many problems of our modern food supply: while it is abundant and cheap, it has many hidden costs, such as environmental pollution and worker abuse.
We want to play a part in making it better.
Leading by example
We are proud to be the first food service company to commit to:
- Supporting local agriculture (with a defined purchasing target), since 1999
- Striving to serve only seafood that meets Seafood Watch® sustainability guidelines for commercial buyers, since 2002
- Reducing antibiotic use in farm animals (2003)
- Serving rBGH-free milk (2003)
- Switching to cage-free shell eggs (2005) and cage-free liquid eggs (2016)
- Tackling food’s role in climate change (2007)
- Addressing farmworkers’ rights (2009)
- Switching to humanely raised ground beef (2012)
- Phasing out pork raised with gestation crates (early 2016)