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MAX BURGERS, fast food has a positive environmental footprint

4. Environment

Context

Voted Sweden's favourite hamburger chain in 2017, Max Burgers was founded in 1968 by Curt Bergfors and Britta Andersson in Sweden and today has more than 130 restaurants worldwide.

Very early on, they realized that their business, beef cooking, did not mesh well with the environmental cause. So, through their activity, they decided to take action by reducing their greenhouse gas emissions and, at the same time, eliminate some of the carbon dioxide already emitted. Beyond climate neutrality, Max Burgers has gradually moved towards a "climate positive" activity.

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Objectives

  • Contributing to the common international objective of keeping global warming below 2 degrees Celsius

  • Prepare and serve 1 out of 2 meals without beef by 2022

  • Helping clients make informed decisions by including the CO2 emission values of each meal on the menu

  • Financing the planting of 1.5 million trees in Africa

  • Provide an example of "climate positive" for other companies

APPROACH

Max Burgers first acquired a complete vision of their greenhouse gas emissions by taking into account all the stages of production and retailing of their products (movement of resources, restaurant consumption, waste, etc.).

Subsequently, measures were taken to reduce carbon emissions through changes in packaging, transportation, electricity, oils. Despite this, beef remained at the top of their list of greenhouse gas emissions. As a result, it was decided to encourage customers to eat vegetarian burgers, incorporating the value of the vegetarian carbon footprint into their menu.

In addition, Max Burgers decided to fund tree-planting projects to move towards a positive climate by offsetting 110% of their carbon footprint. At the same time, the chain became a founding member of Clipop, a positive climate business collective, designed to encourage and support other companies to become climate positive.

CONTRIBUTION TO COMPANY PERFORMANCE

  • 1100% sales increase in 2 years for herbal hamburgers

  • Average sales of 2.2 million euros per restaurant

  • United Nations Climate Action Award 2019

  • Collaborations with other Clipop companies

  • Caring employer with a strong environmental profile

Benefits

  • Reduced climate change by 10% in 2016 and 5% in 2017, while they introduced low climate impact vegetarian hamburgers in 2016

This Best Practice has been translated voluntarily by an anonymous contributor. If you have any comments, please contact mpaquin@reseau-alliances.org.

Mise à jour le 31/01/2020

Creative Commons Attribution This work by Réseau Alliances – World Forum Lille is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.