‘It’s everyone’s responsibility’: are 50% plant-based menus the future for restaurants?

This year is the 10th anniversary of Veganuary, I’m curious to know your opinion on it. How has the trend evolved in 10 years?

I think plant based food has developed enormously in the last 10 years, and I think the rise of vegan restaurants has helped enormously with that. Obviously lots of restaurant chains and pubs realised that it wasn’t enough to just have a vegetarian option, and that actually they needed to also add a plant based option. And that’s now I think, quite prevalent in the UK, which puts us ahead of most countries.

Has there been more customer demand for vegan food? 

I think so. I think people have also become a lot more health conscious in the last 10 years and they are realising that you really are what you eat. And customers are really taking an interest in making themselves more healthy, and not just for them, but for the people around them too.

Moving on to catering businesses, do you think they have adapted well to include vegan options?

It’s one of those things when there’s something new on the scene, people are quick to want to get on board. Maybe at the beginning people thought this was going to be a trend but 10 years in, we can all agree that’s not the case, this is here to stay and it’s growing. 

In recent years, we’ve had companies mass produce plant based equivalents to a beef burger, for instance, which now most people anywhere in the world, if you say “Beyond Meat” or “Impossible Burger”, they’re going to know what you’re talking about. So I think the companies have done a really good job of getting that message across that this is an alternative that you can eat. And I believe for the restaurants, it was an easy thing to add a vegan alternative for customers who wanted to have that option.

Veganuary is obviously just a challenge for one month of the year, but there have been calls both from customers and from activists to switch to more plan-based menus, which brings me to the 50by25 campaign. Can you tell me a bit more about how and why the campaign started? 

So it was started by a charity called Viva. I came on board with it in July. The idea started after what happened last year when restaurants started introducing carbon emissions to menus. They did that to see whether or not that resonated with customers and whether or not it would influence how people choose their food. But what came from that was that including emissions is actually a difficult thing for restaurants to do, very intensive and there has to be a carbon calculator involved. 

That’s where the idea behind 50by25 came from. If every restaurant has a 50% plant-based menu, it’s not hard to do. It’s an easy concept. With the campaign we’re here to really help restaurants, firstly, understand the truth about vegan foods, but also helping them to communicate to their customers that they can feel confident about ordering plant-based foods and how to prepare it in a way that makes it tasty.

How is the campaign doing since it launched? Were the expectations met?

We officially launched last November, at the plant-based world expo, which was really good because it meant that we got lots and lots of support from the industry. So obviously it’s still early to say but it feels like we launched at a good time. 

Restaurants have got two years to do this transition if they sign up now, so it’s going to be gradual, but they will receive support from us and from the industry. 

Let’s say there’s a restaurant that wants to sign up to the campaign, how does the process work? What type of support does 50by25 offer?

All they need to do is go onto our website and enter a few details about themselves and that will then put them on our list. Once they’re signed up, they’ll get lots of support from us in terms of content, but they’ll also be introduced to various different brands, who might be suited, particularly to them. So they can really discover the whole world of plant based foods that are out there. 

We also have a guide to product swaps, we’ll be having plant-based professional chefs giving chef-to-chef advice through a video series. And we’re also going to be actually directing consumers to their restaurants. We’re in the process of creating a map where people will be able to find the nearest 50by25 restaurant — we’re launching that in spring. We’re going to be asking the public to go out and support restaurants that have signed up for this campaign. 

And it’s also important because we can help restaurants have a solution that they can point towards when they’re writing their sustainability reports each year.

What challenges do catering businesses face when introducing or expanding vegan offerings?

Firstly, I think it’s all about how you introduce it. From the feedback that we’ve had from the various restaurants, we believe it’s important to integrate your plant based options and not have a separate vegan menu — the key is to really normalise the options. also the language that they choose to use. It’s best to say plant-based instead of vegan if they want to influence non-vegan consumers, which is really who we are targeting — flexitarian people who want to make better choices for their for the planet for their health. 

What I’m hoping restaurants will realise is that if they put ‘pb’ next to an item that is a vegan option, then they’re going to actually increase the sales of that item because they’re taking away the stigma of veganism and making it about what the food is made of.

Lastly, do you think restaurants and the catering industry in general has a responsibility to educate customers about making more sustainable food choices? 

Well, I think that one of the things this campaign is helping to do is educate. But I think it’s not really anyone’s responsibility — it’s really everyone’s responsibility. So I think if you have a business, its footprint on society is something that any business owner should be thinking about. 

And when it comes to sustainability, enabling individuals to make more sustainable choices is a really easy way for them to increase their impact, and also lower their emissions.