Ashley Hoover, Director of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) at Aspire Bakeries, develops strategies to improve the company’s overall approach to sustainability and social responsibility. She is supported by Drew Harper, Senior CSR Manager, who develops innovative technical solutions to reduce waste and expenses; and Tony Ngo, Aspire Bakeries’ Senior CSR Manager, who focuses on data reporting.
Together, the CSR team supports the Green Champions at the bakeries, who have individual roles to promote energy, waste, and water efficiency improvements at their specific location. With direction from the CSR team and support from the Green Champions, Aspire Bakeries has reduced its carbon footprint by 14.5% and they divert over 95% of their waste from landfill.
In an interview with Food Business Review, Hoover and Harper shared their valuable insights into adopting eco-friendly approaches in the workplace to preserve the environment.
Promoting sustainability
Our Green Champions have a distinct goal to reduce carbon emissions and promote energy efficiency at our 13 bakeries across North America.
A defining moment occurred when we replaced traditional light bulbs with LEDs. It reduced energy usage and improved lighting quality, all while generating cost savings for the bakeries. With a focus on overall optimization of the systems, Drew Harper developed a plan to attain the highest level of power conservation. We started with the LEDs and are now making progress in different stages of the plan, diving deep into durable methods to improve the bakeries’ energy efficiency.
Our goal is to make significant progress on our sustainability journey. We are implementing projects with the help of our seasoned leaders, who support and motivate the team members to engage in and advance our programs.
We are undertaking compressed air projects by understanding the requirements of the manufacturing process. Recognizing the needs will speed up the commencement of work. Through collaboration with other manufacturers, we find a sustainable way of providing the same function. For example, certain types of air dryers waste compressed air, which requires a lot of electricity to produce. To counter that, we are upgrading systems that reduce this waste significantly. In some instances, we hope to take advantage of waste heat from the air compressors to provide the energy needed for air drying.
Reaching Heights through Harmony
Representatives at every bakery are a part of the sustainability initiative. Employees embrace the importance of sustainability and contribute to making changes for a greener future.
Multiple people are working toward the initiatives, including the C-suite team, the corporate sustainability team, and other cross functional leads. Together they implement effective strategies. Local and state funding have made an impact in helping to fund cost-restrictive initiatives and local utilities have provided zero-percent interest on-bill financing loans that enabled Aspire Bakeries to move forward with multiple projects.
“Our goal is to make significant progress on our sustainability journey. We are implementing projects with the help of our seasoned leaders, who support and motivate the team members to engage in and advance our programs.”
Teamwork for a greener future
Our advice would be: “To first identify what sustainability means to your organization, then baseline your utility usage to better understand opportunities for improvement. Based on that understanding, you can create actionable and achievable goals, as well as facilitate accountability and best practice sharing. Building cross-functional relationships is the key to a strong team. To accomplish meaningful work and achieve results, it is essential to emphasize the importance of sustainability and ways in which every individual can play a part in facilitating progress. These initiatives thrive under supportive leadership that motivate and encourage the team to execute projects.”
