Winner: Daniel Whittaker, Green Planet Catering

Location: Raleigh

Business description: Catering company, sustainable educational farm

Number of employees in the Triangle: Five, 25 contracted employees

Top Triangle executive: Daniel Whittaker, chief creator, farm manager

Describe some of the organization’s/ your chief achievements in the Green Awards category in which you were nominated?

"Just getting Green Planet Catering up and running, without any other companies using this model, has been a major task. We were challenged early that a business in the third most wasteful industry in the U.S. (hospitality) would be hard to make sustainable. We realized that transportation and food were our big concerns for controlling waste so we decided to do those items mostly in-house in the form of biodiesel production for our vehicles and a farm for growth of many of our produce items. Daniel worked for more than a year to create a contract with NCSU’s Agro-Ecology program in order to grow food on state land as well as provide educational opportunities to students and the surrounding community. Public speaking and community involvement has been essential in educating the public that there is a sustainable alternative for their events.

Our Earth-to-Earth Cycle was by far the hardest task to get in place. Since we grow items from seed, convert those products to the end menu item, collect all our waste, and dispose of it accordingly, we wanted to make sure it didn’t just end at a landfill. Once all the compostable items are taken to Brooks Contractor and turned to a high-end compost product, it is then delivered and spread back out in to our fields. This means that whatever waste you created at your event eventually went on to help grow items for the next client."

Have sustainable efforts produced financial benefits? Can you quantify the gains or costs?

Being sustainable is a very general term but overall we focus on managing all the waste that we create. By growing a percentage of our own food from seed, we save thousands of dollars a year on produce/organic herbs. By spending less than half of the price-per-gallon at the traditional gas pump, we are also able to pass these savings on to our client in the form of affordable, local/sustainable focused meals.

How could you afford to embark on green programs in a challenging economy?

It helps if you start from the beginning with sustainable practices. Also, any good entrepreneur should pride himself or herself on being resourceful. By getting to know the right people in the community, who care about sustainable practices, we were able to find synergy with other companies and find cross-over for either items that are typically considered waste or for underutilized resources. We also pride ourselves in not having ever received a loan to start the company. Everything has been self-funded and a large portion of our profit goes directly back in to the growth of the company.

How did your employees react to such sustainable efforts?

Each employee (full or part-time) is hired after thorough interviews which include assessing their knowledge of sustainability and their willingness to do “extra” work due to our practices. They start from day one with heavy focus on responsibility to People, Planet, AND Profit. All employees are cross-trained and utilized in order to assure sustainable practices are understood as well as carried out across all steps of the party planning process. Staff at our events take the time to explain to guests why we separate all our trash/recycling/compostables. Employees are taught that just trying to be less wasteful isn’t good enough but instead should start the task with the aim of creating zero waste.

What are your plans for expanding such programs in the coming year?

Green Planet just entered its fifth year of operation and has shown steady growth of approximately 30 percent each year. We’re aiming to move from growing approximately 10 percent of our product to at least 30 percent by 2013. We would also like to open several new outlets by 2014 and targeted areas include Charleston, S.C., and Birmingham, Ala. both of which have rapidly growing sustainable sectors and the resources to re-create our Earth-to-Earth Cycle.