Be Well. Do Well.
Sustainability is a fundamental part of our mission, guiding how we operate. We reduce our environmental impact through practices that enrich and support the natural environment.
Our approach to sustainability is simple: we’re committed to looking after each other, so that together, we can look after the planet.
With the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals as our guiding light, we’ve identified a set of goals with accompanying priorities.
Our first goal is to enable the safety, equity and wellbeing of people, here, within the campus community, and beyond.
These key priorities will help us achieve this goal:
Engage our employees
With a strong foundation that ensures the safety of our employees as our priority objective, we pride ourselves on providing a culture of inclusion that empowers our employees to foster positive relationships and deliver service excellence.
Our goal is to hire, develop, and retain a workforce that reflects the communities we serve. We believe that diversity—of gender, background, age, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, perspectives, abilities and more—is critical to our success.
Empower healthy consumers
We provide the tools that enable, educate, engage and encourage our customers to make healthy choices every day. With a broad selection of tasty, simple, scratch recipes made from nutritious, clean ingredients and clear labels, we make it easier for consumers to achieve their health and wellness goals.
Source locally and build community
We’re committed to maintaining the positive impact our operations have on the millions of people living in our Canadian communities. We support local enterprise through our purchasing, employment opportunities, investment and volunteerism. What’s more, we’re proud to be a part of the diverse social and economic framework that keeps our country strong.
Here’s how we plan to reach our second goal of reducing our greenhouse gas emissions:
Source responsibly
Our purchasing decisions can have significant impact on the Earth and our climate. As a result, it’s critical that we keep sourcing sustainably by increasing our support of suppliers whose methods of production strive to achieve concrete and sustainable development with our natural resources and ecosystems.
We focus on animal welfare, wild-caught and farmed seafood produced using sustainable methods, products that promote fair and equitable global trade, and even minimizing climate change by avoiding products that contribute to deforestation.
We also offer Fairtrade certified products, such as coffee, tea and chocolate in all of our service operations including retail, residence and catering.
Minimize food waste
Our strategy to combat food waste, which begins well before waste is generated, includes menu planning and portion forecasting. For the unavoidable waste that is generated in our back-of-house operations, we rely on proprietary technology to help us track trends and set targets for improvement.
To reduce post-consumer waste we have implemented a combination new technologies and clear, simple communication that helps to educate the campus community and influence positive behaviours.
Reduce packaging
We have witnessed first-hand how unnecessary packaging contributes to waste volumes, and have significantly reduced single-use plastics from our operations. We will continue to eliminate or reduce additional categories of plastics, as well as introduce compostable and recyclable alternatives according to allowable waste streams.
