No matter how careful we are at Wells & Co. to minimise food waste, there will inevitably be leftovers from our guests’ plates, breakfast buffet items that don’t get snapped up and the odd chicken breast that goes past its Use By date in our pub kitchens. So, where do these waste food items end up?

The good news is that ReFood, the UK’s only fully integrated food chain supplier, ensure that this food waste finds a happy new home. Their plant specialises in anaerobic digestion ,a natural process that biologically breaks down organic material to generate large amounts of biogas ; our leftover potatoes and pizza dough end up helping to heat homes! A much better end result for our food waste than a dirty landfill site, I’m sure you’ll agree.

Too Good To Go rescues unsold food to save it from going to waste. Restaurants, cafés, supermarkets, bakeries, canteens and wholesalers in fifteen countries are able to connect with millions of users of the Too Good To Go app, who in turn receive a bargain by getting their hands on a ‘Surprise Bag’ of tasty treats from the venue of their choice.

We’ve found the app a great way to ensure that food otherwise destined for the bin instead finds a happy home, and we love meeting new customers who discover our pubs via the app. Rather than pouring perfectly good beer down the drain during our weekly line cleaning process, the discounted pints we've been able to sell instead have been a real crowdpleaser. People like cheap beer – who knew?

We’ve partnered with the Sustainable Restaurant Association, whose guidance is already proving invaluable in evolving our business into one that supports their vision of ‘an environmentally restorative and socially progressive hospitality sector’. The SRA’s Food Made Good assessment is helping us chart a course towards a more sustainable food offer in our pubs, providing us with a baseline to work from and pinpointing areas for improvement.

The field behind Brewpoint had sat empty since our brewery’s construction. We began to brainstorm ideas to create a point of interest in the space that would give local biodiversity a boost and highlight our sustainability ethos.

The result: Beepoint. Fast-forward nine months and we’re now the proud owners of three new beehives, home to around 25,000 honeybees (they won’t sit still long enough for us to do an accurate head count).

The bees have settled in well; so well, in fact, that last summer saw us harvest 150 jars’ worth of honey for sale via the Brewpoint shop, along with a bucket of the good stuff kept to one side for our Brew Crew to create Beepoint Honey Wheat Lager this spring. With more delicious honey and beer on the cards for 2023, the buzz just keeps on building. 

We're sure it won’t come as a surprise to you when we say that reducing energy consumption in our pubs is a top priority at the moment.

We’re working hard with our pub teams to reduce the energy we use across our estate; between heating, lighting, kitchens and beer cellars, we’re making improvements across the board. We're auditing ourselves, giving us a baseline to work from and helping us to prioritise areas for improvement.

Combining technical innovation with good old-fashioned attention to detail, we're already seeing positive progress. That’s a win for our pubs, and a win for the environment.

We’re proud to announce that, from 1st April 2023 onwards, our entire UK Managed pub estate is powered by renewable electricity. This new arrangement also gives our family business confidence that each new pub added to our estate in future will be powered sustainably.

Nick Wells, our Head of Estates, explains: “Following a period of growth in our managed estate, we now have consistency and visibility of renewable electricity supply to all of these pubs. It’s an important step forward in pursuing our vision of a truly sustainable pub company." 

We're busy this year adding electric vehicle charging points across our estate here in the UK. We’ve partnered with Osprey to get fast charge points installed at a number of our Pub Partner and Managed pubs this year.

Visit our pub in an electric vehicle and you’ll get to enjoy a great meal in a great pub, all while reducing your impact on the environment. Cheers!

Our charity partners, Teenage Cancer Trust, work tirelessly to provide care and support to young people with cancer. Whatever the crisis, they’re determined to make sure no young person faces cancer alone, and we’re committed to supporting them in this mission.

Our brewery and pubs raised £15k for Teenage Cancer Trust during 2022 - a total we’re incredibly proud of - and we’re motivated to build on this momentum throughout 2023. 

Charlie’s Charity exists as a central fund for charitable support across the regions we operate in – and let’s be honest, that support has never been more badly needed than after the few years we have all just endured.

If there’s a cause close to the heart of one of our colleagues or Pub Partners, Charlie’s Charity is our opportunity to turbo-charge their own fundraising efforts. Over the past twelve months a whole host of worthy charities and community projects have benefitted from our support; which cause would you fundraise for if you were part of the Wells & Co. family?