Zero Carbon Forum appoints Bob Gordon as new Forum Director

22 March 2022: The Zero Carbon Forum announces the appointment of Bob Gordon as its new Forum Director. Bob’s remit is to grow the Forum’s membership and services, to further accelerate the sector’s transition to net zero. The non-profit, collaborative action group is dedicated to empowering hospitality to achieve net zero emissions at pace and currently has 35 of the UK's leading restaurants, pubs and breweries as members including Burger King UK, Nando’s UK and IRE, and Fridays.

A passionate and experienced environmentalist, Bob joins the team with over 15 years’ experience working in a variety of senior sustainability roles, most recently at a transformative start-up, building circular economy solutions to the waste crisis. He led Nando’s sustainability and social responsibility agenda in the UK and Australia for eight years, leading on strategy development and implementation and was previously Head of Environment at The British Retail Consortium. He is also a Non-Executive Director of Environmental Communications charity Hubbub UK. 

Bob said: “I have for many years been conscious about purpose and the importance of social responsibility as the global climate crisis looms. In business, it’s necessary for a transformative, circular economy, one that we need to build. It’s about making climate action normal at every level.

Forum founder and chief executive Mark Chapman said: "Having Bob and his phenomenal amount of experience, true passion and strategic vision on the forum leadership team will help us drive the message even further, to take us to the next level and reach our target of industry wide membership as a united effort.”

Bob’s role will be to continue to grow the forum’s membership and develop services that support larger and smaller hospitality organisations to understand their issues better, quicker and have the tools and the guidance to enable them to take action swiftly and decisively. A key part of this is understanding and addressing their everyday business challenges, including the need for simplicity and education in communications in order to drive change.

Bob concludes “One of the really exciting things about the forum is that it is driving sectoral change. Many individual companies across the sector are doing great things, but by moving as a united force we can work on collaborative initiatives that enable us to go further and faster, together.”

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Editors notes

About the Zero Carbon Forum 

The Zero Carbon Forum, is a non-profit organisation which builds on 10 years of carbon reduction collaboration in the UK’s hospitality sector. It enables members to reach their decarbonisation targets faster, more efficiently and more cost effectively than acting alone.

The Zero Carbon Forum published its publicly available roadmap to achieve net zero carbon ahead of the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP 26) in November 2021. 

Members pledge to work collaboratively, by sharing carbon reduction plans and initiatives. By combining expertise and resources the forum helps to identify all possible actions to decarbonise operations across tens of thousands of outlets and their supply chains. 

The Zero Carbon Forum is endorsed by government and backed by trade associations UK Hospitality and the British Beer and Pub Association. Members include leading UK and global hospitality organisations, including Adnams, Azzurri Group, Boparan Restaurants, Brewdog, Burger King UK, Côte Restaurant Group, Fridays, Fuller’s, Greene King, Honest Burgers, InterContinental Hotels (IHG) Hotels & Resorts, JD Wetherspoon, KFC, Marston's PLC, McMullen’s Brewery, Mitchells & Butlers PLC (MAB), Nando's UK and IRE, Pizza Express, Pizza Hut Restaurants UK, Revolution Bars, Shepherd-Neame Ltd, St.Austell, Stonegate, The Restaurant Group (including Wagamama), Wadworth Brewery, WSH, and Young & Co. Brewery, PLC.

 https://zerocarbonforum.com/