#15 Peter Smith: How Bristol’s Ashton Gate Became a Force for Change

In this episode, Philippa talks to Peter Smith about how a football club becomes a force for environmental change, why operations and sustainability are inseparable, and why honesty matters more than perfection on the road to net zero.

Peter Smith is Head of Change and Sustainability at Bristol Sport, the organisation behind Bristol City Football Club, the Bristol Bears Rugby Club and Ashton Gate Stadium. He has spent 17 years with the club, moving from match-day work into stadium development and ultimately  leading its sustainability initiative, Project Whitebeam. Under his leadership, Ashton Gate has signed the UN Sports for Climate Action Framework and won multiple awards for environmental innovation.

In this conversation, you'll hear about:

• How a single "sustainable" coffee cup that nobody knew how to dispose of revealed that the club's good intentions weren't joined up, and how that moment gave birth to Project Whitebeam.
• Why Peter believes there may be no such thing as a single "sustainability expert", and how he broke the topic into five key impact areas: climate change, waste, water, biodiversity and air quality.
• What sustainability looked like during the £45 million redevelopment of Ashton Gate, from a large rooftop solar array and a building management system to sensor lighting and low-flow taps.
• Why the club set bold targets, 50 percent emissions reduction by 2030 and net zero by 2040, before it even knew what its carbon footprint was, and why setting the destination came before knowing the route.
• The "road to hell is paved with good intentions" trap of performative sustainability, and why Peter insists on genuine-impact actions over low-value gestures.
• How fan travel became the club's biggest single impact area, with shuttle buses, free cycle repair workshops, additional train services and cycle usage reportedly quadrupling in recent years.
• The co-benefits of action: unsold pies and pasties going to a homeless shelter, warm clothing collected for people sleeping rough, and a food charity diverting meals from landfill over a five-year period.
• Why Peter manages this as a change-management challenge, devolving responsibility through task forces at each club and asking every department to wear its "green goggles".
• What the EFL Green Club accreditation involves, why Bristol Sport was the first non-Forest Green Rovers club to achieve it, and how the tiered bronze-silver-gold system now helps every club climb the ladder.
• Why Peter argues sports organisations have both a responsibility and an opportunity to lead on climate, given the unique passion and community they bring together.
• His advice to smaller clubs with fewer resources: just get started, find your own thing, and remember that perfection is the enemy of the good.

Key takeaway:

Peter's argument is that sustainability and operations cannot be separated: operations cause the impact, so they must also deliver the solution. Bristol Sport's progress came not from waiting for a perfect plan but from a bias towards action, supported by leadership willing to be bold and a culture of devolved ownership. Honesty is the throughline, refusing to claim the club is "saving the planet" while acknowledging its impact is still too high. The practical message for any organisation is simple: get one building block in place, find the wins that also save money, and never let sustainability take away from what people love.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:02

I'm Therpa Hammond, CEO of Paradigm Norton. And this is Life Practice More, where we explore ESG, sustainability, and the future of business. Today's guest is someone truly transforming the way that sports and sustainability intersect. Not just in theory, but in practice. Pete Smith is the head of change and sustainability at Bristol Sport, the organisation behind Bristol City Football Club, the Bristol Bears Rugby Club, and the Ashton Gate Stadium. From leading the £45 million redevelopment of Ashton Gate to pioneering Project White Beam, Pete has helped position Bristol Sport as one of the greenest sporting organisations in the UK. Under his leadership, Ashton Gate has achieved Green Code accreditation, signed the UN Sports for Climate Action framework, and won multiple awards for environmental innovation. Whether it's cutting emissions, sourcing local food, or creating fan-friendly sustainable transport options, Pete is showing how football clubs can be powerful forces for positive change. Pete, welcome to the podcast.

SPEAKER_02 1:11

Thank you very much, and thank you for uh having me on today.

SPEAKER_03 1:15

I am really looking forward to our conversation. Right, I want to start at the beginning and understand how you got involved with Bristol sport because your journey into sustainability is not a direct one, I think it's true to say.

SPEAKER_02 1:30

No, it's it's not. It's um rather accidental in a way. Um I first started working on match days at Bristol City Football Club when I was at school. Um I stayed working on match days, even though I sort of moved around uh the country and and the world and um just sort of kept in touch with the club. And then in 2009, um they were looking for someone to help out on what was then our involvement with the England 2018 World Cup bid and the new stadium proposals that we had at the time. Um, I'd just moved back to Bristol um and so I took on some temporary work and I'm still here 17 years later. So uh yeah, I I guess it's a connections, but also a a lot of luck and uh just happenstance.

SPEAKER_03 2:22

I love that. Do you know? Whenever I talk to anyone who's sort of in their mid-40s, approaching 50s, where they are is never quite where they thought they might be when they were 17. Um, so you had you you were not thinking about sustainability at that point, you didn't have a background in sustainability. How did you end up being the head of sustainability?

SPEAKER_02 2:44

Well, I think I'd always been passionate about it and interested in it, but I will be honest, not particularly knowledgeable about the uh the details of it. Um back in 2010, I had dabbled, I guess, because we had what was then just British Football Club had taken part in what was called the 1010 Climate Change Initiative, where um organisations were challenged to cut their carbon emissions by 10% in the year of 2010. And I sort of project managed that one, uh, which we achieved, but if I'm honest, through probably more luck than judgment. Um, I think it happened to be a relatively kind year in terms of the way fixtures fell and night games and all that stuff. And we, you know, we did we we did work towards it as well, but it was uh yeah, we sort of got through that. So I've done a little bit, um, and my background um a lot of what I've worked on uh over the last um sort of decade and a half at the stadium has been on stadium and venue development and support of travel, which are obviously quite key contributors to um emissions. Um so I I had a background in areas where we could make significant improvements. Um so when the the sort of the decision was made to do a sustainable issues project, it sort of was relatively natural that I'd uh take that on, albeit I did walk in through the door with a fair degree of ignorance about what I was getting into at the time.

SPEAKER_03 4:23

So uh when we spoke before, you told me a lovely story about a coffee cup in in the in the cafe. Can you tell can you tell us that story?

SPEAKER_02 4:33

Well, it's really where our sustainability initiative, Project White Beam, was all born from. Um I think it was in the wake of Blue Planet 2 when everybody around the UK and actually a lot of people globally were running around sort of looking at single-use plastic and trying to reduce it. Um and I think we pretty fell into the trap that a lot of organizations did. We got fixated on plastic straws um and sort of some some items like that. And yeah, I had been in our on-site coffee shop and um we I noticed that we had a new cup, um, uh which are supposed to be a sustainable cup, and I challenged the coffee shop staff at the time and said, you know, um, well, this is interesting, but which bin do I put it in? And they really had no answer. They didn't know, they hadn't thought about it. So I went off to the head of housekeeping and said, Um, hey, this new cup, which bin does it go in? And they they didn't know. They didn't even realize we had it. And uh spoke to the um the our waste provider at the time and said, Hey, um, we've got this new cup, you know, which bin should it go in? And they said, Well, we can't do anything with it, we'll just incinerate it. Um, so you know, the road to hell is paved with good intentions. Some individuals have tried to do the right thing, but I just realized that it's just one of those things where we just weren't joined up. It's all going to fall down unless as a collective we understood what we were all doing. So I um spoke to my chairman and said, Hey, look, I've identified this as a bit of a weakness and we're expending lots of energy with very little impact. I think we need to scoop it together and do a full project. And um he said, Yeah, that's fine. We can do it as long as you're gonna do it, you know, put it for to you. So it was born.

SPEAKER_03 6:28

Amazing. I mean, I just I love the fact he was so tenacious there about this cup needs to go somewhere sensible because presumably we're spending we've someone has made the decision to get the cup in the door, someone's bought the cups and and put them in. And so it's that interesting intersection, isn't it, between operations and sustainability? And and I guess that forms like quite a large part of your role to how do those two things intersect?

SPEAKER_02 6:55

Um, well, I I guess fundamentally our operations are what causes our impact on the environment. So um, you know, the greenest thing to do would be nothing. Um obviously, not say you'd save the planet if we were to all pack up and go home, it the impact would pop up elsewhere, people are still gonna function and go to entertainment events and everything. But um, so I think if you've got if you're if you're accepting of the truth that you have an impact, um then you can work to understand what that is and how to improve it. Um so yeah, uh operations are the problem, but they're also gonna be the solution. Um, on a more practical level, I think you need to understand your business operation at least to a certain level. Um, because you know, I think we we need to be cognizant that each team and department and organization has the different strains and stresses, and people are motivated by different things. So it's effectively a change management piece, and I think it's actually more challenging if you're parachuted in with all the knowledge in the world and sustainability, but no idea how any given business works. You're gonna hit a load of roadblocks straight away because you're not gonna understand those challenges of different departments and of the organization. Um, so I think I think that was something that helped us a great deal. Um, I've been here for a while, I knew uh an element of a lot of departments, and I understood what we as an organization of do, so you can make a relatively fair judgment on what's gonna work, where the opportunities are, and also what's frankly a dead end road that you you don't need to go down.

SPEAKER_03 8:36

It's such an interesting observation, isn't it? Jim, you bring do you bring someone through and train them up in sustainability, or do you bring a sustainability expert in? How did you how did you upgrade your skills then for someone who didn't have a background in sustainability?

SPEAKER_02 8:50

Um well, I was fortunate that um the management here listened to my pleas and took them seriously and were prepared to put um allow me to use my time and they're putting to put lump some money into some training. So um I still wouldn't profess to be a sustainability expert. There are people that know a lot more about this, but then again, I challenge people. I'm not too sure if there is such a thing as a sustainability expert because there are different facets to sustainability. Um, you're not you're pretty unlikely to be a guru in carbon accounting and also waste management and also biodiversity and also water engineering. So um, but but obviously I needed to understand something. Um, frankly, the first year was just me going around and talking to people. Um and it sounds really silly, but I think at the time we didn't I didn't even really know what what environmental sustainability was. I couldn't define it, I couldn't draw a red line around certain things and really understand what it was. Um so it took me a bit of grappling with that, and in the end, I broke it into sort of five key impact areas, which are still the five key impact areas we we use and focus on today, which are we we believe that our existence has an impact on climate change, waste, water, biodiversity, and air quality. And I think if you talk about environmental sustainability, probably pretty much everything will fall into one of those um columns. Um, and I think that enables us to give us focus and make sure we're we're pulling on all those levers so that we're not um we're not forgetting any one part, which we're quite easy to do, quite easy to forget about water, for example. It's not particularly high on public consciousness, um, but because it's cemented in what we're trying to do and our structure, we we always go back to it. Um so I I grappled with that, I sort of I guess I started to understand the key principles, and then um yeah, I went and did some training courses. So I did a mini masters, it wasn't a full-length three-year part-time masters or a one-year full-time, but I did a mini master's quite intense. Um, and yeah, you know, there's still gaps in my knowledge and experience there, but it gave me enough to get the ball rolling and to to start making the changes in a sort of a coordinated, structured, and um relatively well-defined manner rather than being completely ignorant and sporadic.

SPEAKER_03 11:20

Yeah, brilliant. I love that. Um, you then led the £45 million redevelopment of Ashton Gate, um, which is, I mean, by any stretch of the imagination, a huge undertaking. How did you approach sustainability during that redevelopment? And and I think at the time it wasn't even really a thing in sport.

SPEAKER_02 11:41

No, it wasn't. I mean, the redevelopment of Ashton Gate predated our sustainability initiative. I said we had done the 1010 um very small project a few years before, but um but yeah, it again it was a my first, I guess, sort of day-to-day thinking about it, albeit it was through the prism of as a development rather than a sustainability initiative as such. Um that I mean a fair field of key principles were set up like planning and your planning requirements. So we we knew we had a a sort of a to-do list, but we had some, I can recall some of those meetings like where we were and having the chats and stuff, asking the question of my um chairman and saying, you know, I I know we need to do these things, but could we go a bit better? I think there's probably a bit more opportunity in this, and I I'm very lucky that um he was he was he's a progressive and um well considered and a good listener, which you know sounds a cliche, but it's quite important when you're trying to challenge senior management with some concepts that are quite new and a bit different. Um he's completely open to it, um, very understanding, you know, very positive about what we could achieve. So he said, Yes, go I won't do it. Um, we recognized, especially at the time we didn't have the expertise and house to do much within the state of project. So you know we lent on the resource we did have, which was we were doing a development, we had engineers and mechanical electrical consultants on board. So effectively we turn around to them and say, Look, we you know the requirements for planning, but can you come up with ideas and we're going to challenge you to do more, do better, and do things that will ultimately, once as an operator, anyway, it'll save us money and be more efficient than your operator in the future. And um, so they went away and did it and came back to us with lots of other things we would never have thought about. Concepts I at the time I'd have never even heard of. Um, so yeah, we we delivered a stadium with a very large solar array on on the roof, um, with a building management system in with sensor lighting, with low flow taps, and loads of stuff. Some of it's relatively dry, um, but it but it's and you know it's not all perfect, but it's all built within the venue. And so um then, of course, we had to operate the venue. Um, so we really wanted to push hard on fan travel when we open up the venue. Frankly, we had um a larger stadium that we hadn't been selling out before, so we we wanted to be able to get fans in. Um, we put a huge amount of effort into fan travel over the last few years and won national awards and get sort of, I think, marked 10 out of 10 by the by the league for fan travel, something like 12 times in a row now. Um, and that has co-benefits, I said, because it's all about getting fans in, but also making it easier for supporters and better for the neighbours and better for the community. Um, some things operationally I'd say were pretty potentially pretty came from a different angle, so it's coincidental, but we had a strong commitment to local businesses and lots of local businesses worked on building Action Gate, and we saw an opportunity to do things differently and um bring some in with food supply, which we we might go into later on uh a bit more. But um that was a commit to local business and providing good product. So um that came through the door, and yeah, uh I think stepping back on all of that, I think when you do something as big as a a three-phase stadium redevelopment, or you for other organizations you have you you move offices or premises, whatever, you have that big fundamental change. It's just seeing that as an opportunity to change the way you do things. So we saw the physical changes as a massive opportunity to um be a big operational change, and and effectively it was a a new pretty much a completely new team that took on the new venue and did things in a completely different way. Um, it would have been sad had we sailed through that without making that change and stepped into a new venue doing it in the old ways. I mean, for for all sorts of reasons, far beyond sustainability, it would have been a massively missed opportunity.

SPEAKER_03 16:03

I mean it's a it's a beautiful stadium. I have been there many times, but your sustainability, it hasn't the sustainability journey hasn't ended there. You haven't done the the lovely new stadium and said, right, we're we're done. You've set yourself targets of 50% emission reduction by 2030 and net zero by 2040. How are you gonna do it?

SPEAKER_02 16:27

Um honestly, we don't necessarily quite know yet. Um, just being really honest about it. We look we we so we we we started researching this project in the wake of Blue Plant Suits around 2018, and then that was just literally just me researching myself spare time for quiet hours, and then 2019 came along and I sort of formulated the plan for the project, and we were about to launch it. Um when COVID struck, we launched it internally, but we hadn't launched it publicly. So I think you know, we saw that we stood on the harbour wall looking out to sea, we saw that storm, and so we decided not to take the boat out of the harbour, so to speak, and and we we we regathered the crew post-COVID when stadiums were back open and and set sail in carbon waters to extend that analogy. Um but we but we did so with with the commitment, um, which was very much at the time we didn't even know what a carbon footprint was, let alone how we're gonna make the reductions. But we did it for two reasons. First of all, we felt we maybe three, a marker or you know, a challenge, something to start into, um, as much as anything, to try and drive ourselves. But also fundamentally, it didn't really matter where we were, it was more about where we needed to get to. So it's very much setting a target with the end in mind and then worrying about how we would get there as we went along. I think had we waited to have all the answers before we started and made that commitment, we'd still be sat here now doing nothing. Um, so it it was bold. It took um because of our group structure, I needed to get quite a few CEOs all to sign off at the right time, which different sports clubs always have their different dramas at different times. That was a slight challenge, but but they did all do it, and they all signed up at ultimately being um happy to just take that bold step. I think we're very lucky in in our sporting group that we do like do things differently and set ourselves hard tasks and and not be too cautious around those things. We are quite happy to be quite bold and a bit different. So, yeah, so we we start off with that without the roadmap. Um we've done literally hundreds of things so far. I mean, we do log them and we're into sort of 300 plus individual actions, some are very small, some are much bigger. Um, and we're getting there through a combination of you know, and I again I won't list 300 odd items, but you know, renewable electricity tariffs, electrical or mowers, um, an upgrade to the stadium urinal sounds really dry and boring, but had a really significant impact of 18.5 million litres of water saved every year, which therefore has a carbon value reduction. Um working with suppliers a lot because most of our carbon is in scope three. Um, and although we probably don't have the confidence and the granularity in our data on that yet for it to actually affect our um our carbon reports because we're basically going on spend-based analysis rather than getting into the nitty security of exactly what ingredients are and exactly what products and what have you. But at least we know we're doing it and we're influencing and helping suppliers along the way. Um we've done it through, as I mentioned earlier on, a lot of work in fan travel, um, which I mean, I think in the last eight years we've trebled our use of the shuttle buses. We now have multiple free cycle repair workshops um at the stadium throughout the year. So not every game, but multiple games, which has seen cycle use as quadruple in, I think, about the last three years. Um we've got uh additional um railway train services running from Parcel Street railway station. We never used to have any, and now most evening most events have a post-match train, which is helped um rail travel. Um we've done you know walking maps, uh, journey planners, car shares, all these things. And I label the point on travel a little bit because it is for almost all sporting organizations by far and away the largest single impact area. It's a lot of people traveling often a fair distance. Um and that's a lot of carbon. So it's low-hanging, obvious fruit, and and again, it has co-benefits of also benefiting air quality. If there are hundreds of thousands of cars not circling around the Ashton Gate area on match day, then it's better for our fans, it's better for the residents, it's better for the kids playing the park who just happen to be in the area on match day. Um, and yeah, and we've done it through um uh food again, another high-impact area. Um, taking unsold pies and pastes to a local home with shelter, 11 plant-based foods, uh, you know, proper food choices on match day. Um, we hosted um fair share southwest in one of our outbuildings for five years, and I think they over that time they diverted over five million meals worth of food from landfill to people living with um food insecurity in the area. So that's a long way around of listing out a few things that we've done, um, but we still don't. Quite know our exact trajectory down. We've we've actually we've got we've got our baseline, we've got a couple of reports in the bag, which we're now sort of trying to go through with our um Net zero partner to analyze what bits are working, what bits are tracking well, and what bits aren't. Um we don't have the output of that yet, and then we'll effectively go into a sort of second cycle, if you like, of saying, right, so that's the first few years done with a bit of data behind it to work out where it's all going. Then we'll have to attack the next few years, um 26 to 28, really, and try and I imagine we'll probably have to pull down harder on some of those bits to keep pace. Um, and then we'll again we'll have to have a review of roughly 2028 into how 28 to 30 looks in in order to try and meet that um interim target with 50% reduction by 2030. Um, but I make no bones about it, it's it's a really, really, really tough, challenging target. And I've spoken to other clubs and venues who are on the UN sports for action uh climate action framework with the race to zero targets, and I've spoken to like some of the biggest and best venues in the world on this stuff, and every single one turns around and says, certainly off the record, says this is this is bloody tough, this is really difficult to do, this is not uh uh well just make a couple of quick, easy changes and you're there type problem. So, yeah, we've still got a long way to go on that.

SPEAKER_03 23:35

Thank you. It's a real honest um appraisal of the situation. But what comes out really strongly is this bias towards action, this support from the leadership of the direction of travel. I always think it's really interesting when companies who who the head of sustainability reports into, do they report into the senior leadership team or do they report into marketing? And I always think it's really telling uh which one they um, you know, how how seriously they take this. But you've talked a lot about there about about fans and travel, etc., and that behaviour change thing, quite a lot of it's out your hands, isn't it? Um, so what role are the fans playing in that sustainability strategy? Are you, I mean, are you seeing you've talked there about um how much more people are using the the fan-friendly sustainable travel, but are you seeing behaviour changes anywhere else from the fan base?

SPEAKER_02 24:33

Um yes, we are. It's not brilliantly easy to track because behaviours change match by match year by year depending on lots of different factors. Um most obviously take um take travel and food, two big high impact items that most people not everyone travels to a game, most people eat something. Um they vary considerably match to match year by year depending on surface answers. So, you know, if uh if it's if it's wet, a lot of people jump in their car, they don't particularly want to queue for buses in the rain, they prefer to drive door to door. Um, you sell different food products in the winter. Funnily enough, you sell a lot more hot drinks, and in nice sunny days, you sell a lot more ice cold ciders. You know, it's um so I think fans interact with it probably on different levels. Um, some we probably benefit from them just always being relatively passive, but at least just wanting to be supportive and understanding of what we're doing and see the value, they don't need to particularly care too much because we're doing a fair bit for them anyway. Um I think some behaviour change will some will have behavior change because we've facilitated it, and whether that's because they've actually chosen to do it for sustainability reasons or because we've just opened the door for them to have that, you know, better fan travel with different food option, whatever. And then we've got some champions who um take the ideas, take our ideas and inspirations and take the education pieces that we give out to them and they interact with it and engage. When we put a a link to a carbon calculator on a story, they they do their they do that and they make their um their own sustainability pledges through our partner charity Pledge Ball, and they um they they frankly adopt behaviours inspired by us far beyond the stadium or match day. They do it at home, they do it because um whatever reason they they they they enjoy that connection between two things they love. So yeah, so we have seen the changes. Um I mentioned some of the metrics on fan travel before. Um when we installed the water fountains at the stadium, we already had a few, but we installed some new ones with um with the which would sort of measure every time somebody took the water, you know, had the counters on them. That's roughly I mean it's a crude analysis because if I was to assume that if people didn't refill per litre, that they would otherwise fill up a 500 milliliter single-use plastic bottle, we shouldn't necessarily know that for sure. But let's take that it it would be a thousand um single-use plastic bottles every month saved. And they when we do our donation stations at match days for fans to return um unwanted warm clothing for local homeless people or football kit to um you know to go out to partner charities and what have you. Um they they do it and they do it in really good numbers. Um so so we can see that interaction. Um, I think to sort of round off this point, we probably need to know that not all fans are the same, that they're not one homogenous group, everybody's very different, and it you know, especially in football, it's a very broad church. Um I think we're right to use our platform to educate, celebrate, and inspire, but we're not here to to preach. Um, we've all got an impact. Um, the the club still has, as I said it before, uh an impact that's still too high. And da da da um as an operator on a personal level, I have an impact. Every day I wake up and you know, I measure my carbon footprint every year, and I'm always over what I should be, so I'd just be open and honest about that one. Um and then the I guess the final thing to note is that whatever we do, we sustainability cannot take away anything from the Fang Match Day experience. If it does, if it starts to, it's just not gonna work. Um, if anything, it should be adding to the experience. And I think so far, generally speaking, we've achieved that. Um so unless somebody wants to deliberately be negative about it for any particular uh you know pre-existing reason, there's it's pretty hard to like, you know, if we're providing local food from suppliers that you like and have an affiliation to that, and you like the product, and providing better fan travel, and we're diverting um you know warm clothing away from landfill and in onto the backs of people living on the cold streets of Bristol and helping the community, then that's stuff to love anyway. Um so yeah, I I I hope fans are engaging with it well. We we know that when we put stuff on social media, you bluntly probably get two audiences, which is one just for no particular reason, just they just don't like us talking about it. There's no specific reason why it's just either why I don't know, and and there's some that will feel that we're not doing enough. Um, I'm relatively happy with both because if people are giving us pelters, then at least they're at least we're engaging with people that may not um be in the same um brain space as we are on this, and you know, we'll we'll ride it, that's fine. And if people are criticizing us for not doing more, then I'm also happy with that because it's just it shows that there's a will in the fan base to do more. Probably the better reflective stuff and certainly more helpful stuff comes through fan surveys, and it's uh very, very highly reporting. Belief that we are that we should be doing either what we're doing or more. Um, I can't recall the exact figures, but it's a it's over 80%, I think. Sort of, you know, we're very positive about the fact that their club was doing stuff in the environmental space. So um that's probably a bit of more of a better reflection.

SPEAKER_03 30:24

Yeah. Yeah. Okay, so I want to move on and talk a little bit about some of the awards that you have won. Um, you were the first club, I think, to achieve the Green Code accreditation. What is the green code accreditation? How do you go about getting it? What difference has it made?

SPEAKER_02 30:45

So, yeah, so um Green Code was um born out of um the Green Bristol Group who owned Forest Green Rovers, and effectively what they did a few years ago in partnership with the EFL was to say, look, we've got a blueprint um which we're happy to share with other clubs, um, and we can rank them. And we can get give them either if they if they're doing really well, they'll get green code status. So technically, Forest Green were the first club to have Green Code status because they had it, it's their framework. We were the first um non-FGR club to get it. Um, and for a couple of years it was just us that had it. Um, so it is a basic, it's an accreditation scheme. Um, what the Green Code is an organization, it's it's a it's an EFL scheme, uh, Green Clubs, um, but you go through Green Code to get the accreditation and they will assess you across, I think it's around 32 questions over around 10 areas, and so it's quite a thorough, broad process. It covers a range of actions. Um, you basically tell them what you're doing, it evidence it. I think we provided something like 120, 130 pieces of evidence to show uh what we had been doing. It's actually audited through another third party, um, so independent of both the EFL and Green Code, actually go through the um the audit process with you. So it's you know, I I'm I'm proud of very proud of it for a few reasons. Um it it's it's open to all EFL clubs, um, the the Green Club scheme, and it helps them all along the path. So I I like it because of that, because I we don't want to do this alone. We want all clubs to go along with us. I like it because it's it means a lot to get it, because it's a very genuine and thorough process. It's not an easy thing to get, it it it's a fair reflection of good work, not just sort of performative stuff. And the going through the process actually helps almost all clubs, I think. Um we're pretty good at this stuff, and it helps us because it's a it's a good framework fundamentally, so it's it's a good structure for clubs to base their own project work off of. Um so yeah, so Green Green Clubs was launched uh, I think I'm trying to remember now, a few years ago. Um we we got green code status. The scheme was relaunched uh a couple of years ago, which is now tiered system through EFL Green Clubs. You either get you can either be a participant, get bronze, silver, or gold. So we are EFL Um Green Clubs Gold, and one other club now has that as well, which is great. Um, we worked a little bit with EFL to advise on the relaunch of that scheme, which we're only pleased to do. I think the greater system works better because it's uh it's easier to understand what the difference between gold, silver, and bronze is whether it just green code or not was a bit cryptic. And it also gives everybody a ladder. So if you're doing a lot of work but you're not quite at gold, at least you're getting credit for for where you're at. You're differentiated from clubs that are doing nothing, for example, you can at least say you're getting green club silver. And and if you are at a very low base and a standing start, you've you've got a you've got a ladder to climb up there. You know, you can if you haven't got anything yet, you can aim for bronze. If you get bronze, you can aim for silver. So I think a really positive scheme. I'm sometimes the first to criticize sports organizations and leagues. Um, but I'll give credit to the the EFL here. It's a very well-run, very well-administered scheme, which benefits its member clubs.

SPEAKER_03 34:20

Yeah, yeah. I mean, I I it's interesting how you know you see these accreditations and you think to yourself, well, should we do that? Should we not do that? And my experience is they always make you better. Because you know, having somebody else look at what you're doing, or you can't fudge it. You have to, even if you're able to tell yourself, oh, it's fine, but the the use of water or whatever, if you're having to prove it to someone else, having to demonstrate to someone else, I think it's a really powerful thing. Okay, so presumably when you were doing that, you had to bring the entire organization with you. So you've spoken about how you worked with the CEOs of the different parts of the business, but you've it's not just CEOs, it's staff, it's athletes, it's vendors, it's the whole supply chain. How do you get that whole disparate group of people who might not have the same views as you on board with all of this? It is hard work.

SPEAKER_02 35:17

Yeah, it is. Um, I think you achieve it through lots of talking and probably more importantly, lots of listening. Uh, in in my experience, again, every company, even football's probably different, but you've got an awful lot of staff who want to do it, they are if they're if they're evident, it's because they either they don't know a lot about the areas, then they're nervous about stepping into something that they're completely is uh completely new to them, or they're just they've got other stresses and strengths, you know, they're they're just automatically nervous about their budget or their time, whatever it is. So, you know, I think you it can be tough, but I think you need to be creative and ultimately want each other to succeed. And I think we've got that, which is very helpful. Everyone wants the project to succeed. Um challenge for us is that sport changes very quickly. It's not a it's not a brilliant industry for setting out multi-year plans. Um, as we all know, sports teams on the pitch and organizations away from the pitch as well, change quite rapidly, and staff change rapidly. So um that that can be a challenge because you know you you engage with staff and then very quickly, you know, you managers and players and sponsors and staff and suppliers come and go relative quickly. So it's like painting the fourth bridge. By the time you think you've got everybody on boarded and understand and working through it, something changes, but that's just the way it is. So we you just have to be tenacious and keep on with it. Um, we do it at all levels, so I regularly present to the owner, uh, regularly present to the players and the management team. Um, we regularly present to and provide internal comms to the office staff, stadium, and training ground. Um, I think probably the biggest uh thing here is that we've devolved a responsibility for the action to the team members. We have a task force at each club and we make sure that each department has a representative on a task force. So it that's really important because if it all went through me, then not much will get done because one person can't do everything, but also I'm not an expert in their area and their field, they are so as long as they're you know looking at everything through a green lens. We often talk internally about wearing your green goggles, and just I want the concession manager and the housekeeping team and the marketing team to you know walk into work every day, and if they see something be done better and greener, they should be the ones spotting it, coming up with the idea, not me. Um so that has helped us get stuff done, but it's also helped um engage and make everybody a part of that of that journey. Um, you know, it's uh it's a structure that's worked. It's uh to use a completely stolen metaphor. Um, I think I heard it in an event in Bristol, it's not mine, and I can't take credit for it. But um, this is at the very early stages of setting up the project. They said, Look, um, I'm I'm not a conductor and this isn't classical music, so you're not gonna get sheet music, and I'm not gonna tell you all when to come in. This is jazz. We've set a beat, you've all got your instruments to look, you know, strum along. And as I'm completely stolen, but I often say that to the internal team please don't wait for me for instruction on everything because it we'll be waiting for it's far too long, we've got a lot to do. Um, and by engaging them, and then when they get a little bit of success, that's a huge motivator. Um, people don't they're very scared to make changes, they're fearful for what they're doing wrong. When they make the first change and it goes well, and they get credit for it, which they're right, they should do, then you know everybody wants to be on a winning team, don't they? So um, so we do celebrate it, and you realise that all your hard work is being noticed rewarded.

SPEAKER_03 39:08

Yeah, winning team Ashton Gate, I mean, that's one of the dream, isn't it? And how do you go set uh how do you go about celebrating the wins?

SPEAKER_02 39:16

No, I think I think we we celebrate it publicly to with with supporters, we'll we'll let supporters know where we are at on the journey. Um I know that can be confusing, especially if you're you're new to sustainability, you won't particularly know what different awards and accreditations mean, but at least they can see that we're doing stuff. Um we we recognise it internally by I mean we'll always make sure that uh staff are aware of other people's achievements in the area. Um, and so those those teams just get the applaudits directly because they're the ones they're the ones doing the action, not me. Um, you know, it's it's not me that I don't take and organise all the food to go to the local homely shops week after week after week. Dave and his team do that, and they're really good at it, and they should be doing it because they're the experts in handling food, and I'm not. So um, yeah, we we we try to make sure we do it all the while. I should say it there isn't balance there because we also want to be quite honest about the relativity of this stuff. We we're not gonna walk into any room or say to any fan base or audience, hey look, you know, we're saving the planet here. Lily look at what we've achieved, because we're not. We've still got an impact, as I said, every single day, match day and non-match day. We have an impact on all the five key areas I mentioned earlier on, and we've got a long way to go, but we are ahead of most other clubs by a significant way in many of those areas. So, you know, there are other clubs doing some really good stuff, um, but we should celebrate the fact that we're we're doing this well, and and also in most of the stuff we've done so far, it's had co-benefits to us. So um, a lot of impact area things cost money, you know, it costs to heat a stadium, it costs to buy products, it costs to then dispose of products, um, all of that stuff, you know, food waste, food waste is it's money down the drain. So um, yeah, so we also celebrate it because we're also getting other other wins in our budget lines, if you like.

SPEAKER_03 41:20

Yeah, and on that, on that note, one area we haven't we haven't drilled into, uh, and I'd like to even just briefly, is that tension between sort of commerciality and sustainability, planet versus profits. Um how are you how do you balance those environmental goals versus the profits that any any company needs to make?

SPEAKER_02 41:44

Yeah, well, um we're we work in sports, so profit's an interesting concept. It's more about minimizing losses. Um, but I think the the two regular conflict, if I'm honest, but they also regular benefit each other because to my mind, at least for us, they're two completely separate ecosystems that sit alongside each other by by chance. They're not designed to either work together or to try and harm each other. The world economy was born long before anybody realized what climate change was, and frankly, climate change was happening in a respective world economy. So there might be some who disagree with that and believe that growth is a fundamental stretch of resources and that they they can't live in harmony and all that stuff, and sort of getting into your your Kate Reworth donut economic type discussions there. But um so there is that viewpoint, but I think I don't think it has to be that way. I think there are plenty of ways to achieve environmental action while frankly saving yourself money as well. Certainly at the start, I think there's normally low-hanging fruit for us. There was that achieve both very easily, and you know, we mentioned all those things that we we pay a lot of money for and that we're now making good financial savings for, purely because fruit because of sustainability, we started looking at things differently. You know, it's just a um a different view and a different uh reworking of your mindset, just enable us to do things that opportunities that are on the table anyway, to either make or save the money. Um, so yeah, pick off the low-hanging fruit. Obviously, once you get through all of that, it will become a little bit harder. There will be some things that might have uh you know much longer um time for to achieve return on investment, some might not at all. And then I think you have to you have to make a balance judgment, right? Is is it is it the wrong thing that we you just can't realistically afford now, and you you it's wrong for you to even attempt it. Is it something where financially at first glance it doesn't necessarily quite weigh up or has quite a long payback period, but there's a there's a value you can extract from it elsewhere, which is quite often the case when you think differently about things, you it doesn't necessarily work straight away, but you yeah, you can you can find a benefit and um and then you've got to work to quantify, obviously. Or are there certain behaviours that you just fund basically accept that it might cost a few quid, but you just believe that's the right thing to do. I think on a lot of fronts these days, most businesses in 21st century Britain have behaviours and operating practices which we no longer do because they're not considered acceptable anymore. And yes it would be cheaper to run things like a you know 19th century Victorian warehouse or whatever, but we we don't fool for obviously good reasons. So with the environment sometimes the impact on the the flora and fauna of people is is a little bit removed because the carbon that we throw up in the air in Bristol may not necessarily affect us as much as it affects people on the other side of the world but it is still knowingly a negative impact on the lives and livelihoods and health of people. So at some point you have to draw a you know make a judgment call on things if it's just a small bit of money but to achieve a big win that's for the better of your community and the world then I think you just you make the case and it you know it has to be signed off by everybody. I don't get to make independent decisions on all that stuff. But but yeah we we've we've got an ethos and we'll we'll follow through and sometimes make those calls. So as a as a club as a a group of companies that are leading the way in this and given the niceties and and the the the the way that sport as you say is is not the same as running a a manufacturing business do you think sports organisations have a responsibility to lead on climate issues a soft yes but it but it but it's a yes I think we do because ultimately as I said made the quip earlier on about the fact that we're we're not particularly profitable as a the sporting clubs aren't um so you know ultimately we're not in here to to make lots of money um as such we you know money is very important of course it is and it affects the impacts of pitch performance and everything that's very important but we're fundamentally we're a community organization um we exist because for hundreds of years or well over a hundred years people in Bristol have wanted to play sport watch sport engage with sport come together right so um so so when you talk about community health and wellbeing of community is fundamental right so I think we we do have a responsibility there it's not just about climate change for people on the other side of the world but it's about um when I was talking about waste earlier on it's you know litter in the park right next to the stadium where the next generation of kids play um it's about the air quality of those children and the elder and the health vulnerable who come to games and live in our community. So yes I think there is a responsibility there. I think there's a good reason as well because it affects us too climate change does affect sport. I know some people are quite happy to put their fingers on their ears and think it doesn't it does in relatively recent years you've had the pinnacle of global sport affected increasingly by environmental issues. You've had the triathlon postponed at the summer Olympics in Paris due to water quality I mean this is the biggest sporting event in the world um having to postpone events and mess around athlete schedules and all those spectators just because the water isn't good enough. You've had Formula One races in Italy completely cancelled due to flooding um you know we are all you know at amateur level of football I can't remember the exact stats but it's 1400 amateur games a year postponed due to flooded pitches. The belief that we can build our way out of this is absolute nonsense. We are open air sports um we we don't play football and rugby especially inside and and even then we're reliant on infrastructure we're reliant on the rails not buckling to get fans to games we're reliant on tarmac not melting we're relying on wind not ripping off bits of um you know infrastructure or over our venues so it does affect us too um but I think as much as an opportunity uh as much as a responsibility is probably an opportunity for sports teams as well um we unlike a lot of businesses we have this great luxury and um we're very privileged to bring people together like very very few businesses can and as a really broad range of people together where where there's this incredible mix injects it's banging into the middle of all that this ridiculous passion and community spirit um I use example I'm Bristol City fan and Bristolian but my brother's Palace fan and I've got a few fan friends who are and for those that don't follow football they they won the FA Cup last year first major trophy in the club's history. And when they did it I was expecting all my mates to be texting me images of them celebrating going mental and throwing you know beer cups in the air whatever it was every single one of them was basically in tears grown I believe grown men in tears just because their team had won a trophy it's ridiculous but that's what it is that is the passion of football. It's brilliant and so it's stupid of us to ignore that passion and excitement which brings so many people together and to not use it and harness it. So yeah I think as much as responsibility I think we've got the opportunity to to do some really good stuff in this space.

SPEAKER_03 50:14

Can I just say you have made me feel so uplifted by your answer to that question. You know my word of 2026 is community I think the power of community the power of that having that lens of we're all in this together we're all neighbours we're all you know fighting for the good life I just think that as a sort of a remoralisation lens of corporates in general not just in the sporting environment is a really exciting thing and I I just loved your answer there.

SPEAKER_02 50:53

I found it really really uplifting and really exciting so thank you on uh that sort of inspirational um theme have have other sports clubs teams companies reached out to you to say we see what you're doing we really love what you're doing we want to do it help us yeah yeah those have um which which is great and it's something that we're very happy to do where we think that we can help and take things beyond our own border so to speak I think in the last 18 months or so we've probably had around 14 or more professional rugby and football clubs either come to visit us or we've addressed their team staff remotely or whatever we've we've had our case studies issued um to green sports uh bodies in in the US we've had we've um we've had visits from um Japanese clubs and the league um who have been over here on a trip who also want to look at sustainability and have come to us um we've set up an informal network of football club chief executives to discuss sustainability because um we realized that for a lot of clubs we were a bit different we we're able to get the support of our senior leadership owner and CEOs but a lot of clubs were struggling um so we said well could we get those CEOs in a room with our CEO and some other clubs that were on a similar trajectory to us um and share thoughts about how it can be achieved at a strategic level um so we've we've been happy to sort of facilitate that net open up and facilitate that network um I think you know I'd I'd like to think that disseminating our ideas or lessons learned and everything means that we have an impact far beyond our own organization. I think we benefit a great deal from being ahead on on the sustainability curve but it doesn't mean I don't want everybody else following following through in fact I I very much do the power is in clubs going together it'll make our job easier so we're happy to do that. And I think probably the other thing here is when we've spoken the price when we speak to fans as well but especially to other clubs is just honesty is your superpower we we've never pretended as I said before we touched on it earlier on didn't we know we've never pretended to fix it all have all the ideas and um and and all that stuff we're we're very conscious and cognizant of the fact that oh our impact's still high and we still need to do more and I think when we can be honest with other clubs and say don't don't get bogged down in the fact that you're not perfect. Don't beat yourself up about it don't bury your head in the sand on it there's a path it's better it's achievable and you know other clubs have done it including Cells and um we're we're happy to I guess lead in that field and you touched on it earlier on we've we've been very fortunate to have won quite a few national awards and accreditations on this because we've put the effort into it um we've done it well and we've found ways to get value from it so if we can pass pass that on to other clubs then yes we've we're obviously very helpful to do so just as we we still speak to other well we we took a lot of ideas from other organisations at the start of our journey and and we still do still regularly text colleagues from other clubs and say you know have you heard of the solution I see you've done that how did it work and people are quite happy to be open and honest about it as we are.

SPEAKER_03 54:32

So here is your platform uh if yeah what would you say to a club that wants to act but perhaps might feel a bit constrained by their size or their resources what would your advice to them be I think I think it's probably a case of just get started somewhere anywhere just do something um once you get going a lot of things fall into place that the the trying to map this out theoretically when you haven't even started is very very hard it's like trying to nail jelly to the wall so you just do something get one building block in place and you can put from that you know perfection is the absolute enemy of the good in this space and I said it before if we were able to have a perfect plan and perfect ideas we'd we'd still be sat here now doing nothing.

SPEAKER_02 55:21

So um I'd probably suggest certainly with the sports industry I know um I think find your own thing I try and caution clubs although we speak to all these clubs about the stuff that we do it doesn't necessarily mean that we've got a boilerplate that they can just you know copy and paste to them. All clubs are different all staff are different all cities all stadiums all sports are different so find what works well for you um and don't try and fit another club's square peg into your round thing it's it won't work and and I just advise them to just also be be genuine and honest about your impact throughout the throughout the thing not not just because I think it's important for messaging but I think you just avoid getting tempted into doing a load of very low value performative actions. We do stuff here that engage and excite and incentivize and all that stuff and I think clubs should but there have to be some things that you're doing that have a genuine impact and and in yourself. So yeah I think it's nothing there's nothing stopping any club from doing something. I I know especially down the football pyramid it gets harder your resources tighter but clubs can do it. Forest Green are the world's most sustainable club they're not a massive club by any stretch they've got good resource but then you know another club that done very well in this space is Sutton United and they've got constraints um so yeah I think there's where there's a will there is a way to to do at least something brilliant Pete we're gonna move on to uh the end of uh the the interview now and do some quickfire questions okay so what is your favourite sustainable upgrade at Ashton Gate? Um I'm not sure upgrade I'm not sure it's quite right to say but I'd say it's the fact that our unsold food and pasties go to a shelter that is literally 200 metres away and the fact that we we gather clothing in every year for local people who might be living rough on the street in desperate for warm clothing they may not be the biggest impact items in pure sustainability terms but they are much loved by the fans in the community because of that co-benefit and I think there's a yeah I think it just rounds everything off nicely. Yeah beautiful matchday food pasty or falafel wrap oh pasty cheese and onion pasty pint of cider yeah I mean I like about falafel wraps as well but no match day lovely cheese and onion past in a pint of cider can't beat that one uh one underrated sustainability hack that every business should try ooh um I don't know it might be a cop out I'm not sure that have one I I think it I think it probably is about uh okay I just touched on actually I think it is about finding your own thing that would be my hack is find your own thing you you you know your impact area and the thing that you can achieve relatively easily I wouldn't necessarily go chasing other people's uh choices if you had a billboard outside every football stadium in the UK what would it say? Uh well I'll if I'm allowed I'll go non-sustainability for this for a second I will I would say nothing about sustainability actually for this one um I'm I my it would say something along the lines of though the wording would need to be fine but just enjoy it because we we mentioned on it before I'm as as passionate City fan Bristol City fan as anyone I love the club I love the stadium I love the fan base I love the culture I love the city of Bristol I love the South West I've been see city play at Harrogate Hartleypool Haybridge Swifts the lot and all that raw fan stuff the noise the colour and the atmosphere the excitement I'm not suggesting that you take any of that out for this single second in fact the opposite what I do think is when all is said and done we should recognise embrace it and take a moment to realise just how beautiful it is but it's at slight risk I guess of um but going too serious on this on this point. We we live in a world where there's my numbers probably bit jumbled up here but something like I think of 700 million people in the world go hungry and I think it's one in four don't have safe drinking water with one in three not having a toilet and then one that I heard the other day was something about 15% of people living either in a conflict zone or within five kilometers of conflict zone. So it's not all about winning if we all wanted to win every week we'd go support you know Real Madrid or Man City or Arsenal whatever it is it's it's far deeper than that and I think we should always take a moment to reflect before and after and during a match day that if you've gone to a game and you've had a chance to chat to your dad or your brother or your sister or your mate on the way to the game you've befriended some totally random person you've got nothing in connection with in the pub and you've enjoyed a nice halftime pine and you've chat to somebody who don't know for 90 minutes about football on a complete level even though you might be very different characters and you're doing all that just because there's a game to watch um I think it's a thing of beauty and we're very very lucky to be able to have that so win lose or draw whether the traffic's good or bad even if your pie's a little bit burnt just just enjoy the game is a and I think fans are very very good at that by the way I think most fans uh especially at Football League level are they they they know they know why they love their club and they um and they do appreciate it.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:09

That is a perfect end to this podcast just enjoy it I have so enjoyed talking to you today Pete I have learnt so much and like the themes that have come down out around collaboration owning the problem green goggles the ambition that you have the honesty that you have around that ambition um that powerful lens and the the the plea for us to engage in in community could not be more important so Pete thank you so much for today I have love talking to you and if you've enjoyed listening to this please tell your friends uh send this podcast on to others and most of all keep asking excellent questions Pete thank you thank you very much this podcast is intended to be of a general nature will not be suitable for everyone and should not be treated as a specific recommendation we recommend taking professional advice before entering into any obligation or transaction.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:13

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