The National Restaurant Association’s Conserve program, begun in 2008, is a broad initiative that helps operators implement conservation practices that are good for the environment and their bottom line.
Moving conservation forward
As a thought leader, industry collaborator, clearinghouse of best practices, and reporter of conservation success stories, Conserve facilitates and expedites solutions that today’s restaurants increasingly use to protect the environment. Conserve is where restaurants turn for practical tips, suggestions and resources that simultaneously reduce their costs and bolster their bottom line.
Meet Conserve, a driver of restaurant industry-focused, environmentally friendly conservation practices. Conserve functions as a catalyst of new solutions, garnering and generating ideas from across the industry, sharing them online and delivering them through its education program. The program primarily addresses four core areas of conservation: energy efficiency, water conservation, building and construction, and waste reduction and resource management. It has become the restaurant industry’s one-stop shop for conservation solutions.
The Conserve Sustainability Education Program is an online resource that provides participating restaurateurs with a customized roadmap to reducing their energy usage, waste and water consumption. Its program is tailored to each operator’s restaurant concept and hectic schedule, and includes tools such as checklists, industry-tested best practices and videos.
Conserve collaborates with other organizations, such as the Food Service Technology Center, Zero Waste Zones and EPA Energy Star, to advance the field of conservation across the restaurant industry. These partnerships have led to the Sustainable Food Court Initiative for sustainable practices in multi-tenant programs, to new best practices for achieving zero waste at restaurant operations, and to invaluable research on restaurant conservation practices, implementation and demand.