Aligning with the client’s sustainability mission: garden addition
With sustainability at the top of mind for many industries and organisations, service providers are no different as we collaborate on ways to ensure we help protect the planet and preserve our lands for those that follow us. At ISS Guckenheimer, sustainability is at the forefront of our strategy. Our approach to sustainability is built on taking good care of our employees and the environment, as well as our customers.
Guckenheimer food services team wanted to better align with our client and their employees’ focus on sustainability. They did this through the development of an onsite garden on the client’s campus property. The garden and its locally grown produce offered a two-fold solution: an environmentally friendly food source and a healthier produce solution. Daniel Vercher, Executive Chef at ISS Guckenheimer: “We use all of the plant, from root to stem, in our cooking in our mission to create a sustainable solution for our own team and the client.”
From waste to produce solution
Our team started the garden by using their root trimmings and peels from produce to create a compost. Every year they plant produce based on the season and what the chef has in mind for future menu creations.
Over the next two years following the initial development in 2018, the team has designed and built two seasonal gardens that now produce a wide variety of produce and herbs from cucumbers, potatoes, romaine, celery, carrots, peppers, arugula, radish, basil and more. In addition to being able to enjoy the seasonal, organic produce in the café, the customer’s employees are also able to purchase produce and dry herbs to help avoid oversupply and waste.
“
I have worked for many corporate accounts and never have I seen such an amazing organic garden that offers so many benefits to the onsite employees.
The garden’s homegrown benefits Beyond the food supply, the ISS Guckenheimer garden has also provided added educational and cost-saving benefits. The customer’s employees enjoy cooking classes focused on vegetable cookery and hosted in the garden itself. The café team has also welcomed culinary students and the customer’s guests to tour the gardens to showcase the partnership between the two companies and the joint focus on sustainability. This sustainable solution has saved the team $5,000 per year in produce purchases. With this savings the client has reinvested in the food program and purchased honeybees for the campus. The café team and the customer are working together to offer organic honey for the food program and employees to purchase. In addition to the cost savings, the team has received an overwhelmingly positive response from the client and their employees. ISS Guckenheimer customer’s employee: “I have worked for many corporate accounts and never have I seen such an amazing organic garden that offers so many benefits to the onsite employees. The program even allows us to take vegetables home and cook them for our family, extending the curated experience outside of work.”
Stay up to date
Sign up to receive the latest insights from ISS. You can unsubscribe at any time.
INSIGHTS
Stories about people, places and planet
PEOPLE
Honesty, passion and respect – the keys to an exciting career at ISS
A career in ISS offers lots of professional challenges and rewards, as Wilson Selvaraj has discovered during his 16-year journey.
At ISS, our goal is to help our employees feel valued, engaged and respected. Our inclusive culture means we focus on empowering people to contribute with their unique skills and perspectives. Find out how ISS Hong Kong is committed to nurturing the next generation of special needs youths through our SHINE@ISS programme.
Bringing Trust and Transparency to the Canteen Experience
Customer satisfaction measurement is key to the work we do; we use annual as well as project-specific surveys to measure satisfaction, including real-time feedback tools such as Happy or Not. This tool has been used recently for a global manufacturing company to measure satisfaction at their workplace restaurants around the world.