Fine Arts Cafe Waste Audit
October 26th, 2011 marked the culmination of many weeks of planning, meeting with mentors, and revising our timetable in preparation for a waste audit within the Fine Arts Café at the University of Virginia. Ironically, this day happened to be “Sustainability Day” within the UVA community, providing even more motivation to develop substantial and informative results. Over the course of the past two months, we have gained a better grasp of the potential waste impacts occurring within the Fine Arts Café as well as the aggregate amounts of waste produced from everyday customers. Our initial hopes primarily focused on achieving substantial results that could curb wasteful habits within the café as well as the University of Virginia community. To raise student and staff awareness of more sustainable food options and habits, we designed marketing posters, a presentation within the Architecture School, and worked in coordination with the Green Dining student advocates to use the Observatory Hill flat screen television monitors and table tents to publicize our results. Lastly, after confronting a few initial challenges following the first waste audit, we have reorganized our project aim to advocate the use of re-usable to-go containers within dining facilities on grounds. Most importantly, we have maintained focus on our ultimate goal throughout this process, which is to create a more sustainable, less wasteful and therefore more cost-effective environment within the Fine Arts Café. Secondary goals included analyzing the Fine Arts Café’s inventory costs and operation system to pinpoint new potential for efficiency improvement and develop ways to reduce the everyday food and packaging waste produced. Our project definition has evolved to encompass new challenges and innovative ideas that our team has worked through alongside our mentors. Besides determining the amount of trash and waste produced from the café, we also hope to limit wasteful customer habits and encourage alternative solutions that are inherently “greener” and sustainable. We have developed ways to approach this issue, which can be found detailed later in the report.
Local Food, Waste Audit, Fine Arts Cafe, sustainable food production, food system, local resources, University of Virginia, Michaela Accardi, Jordan Holleran, Austin Walker, Katie Woodward, reusable to-go boxes, habit
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Fine Arts Cafe Waste Audit

Local Food and Food Waste (click PDF)

Fall 2011

Team members: Katherine Thorsey, Tim Gaylord, Benji Cook

October 26th, 2011 marked the culmination of many weeks of planning, meeting with mentors, and revising our timetable in preparation for a waste audit within the Fine Arts Café at the University of Virginia. Ironically, this day happened to be “Sustainability Day” within the UVA community, providing even more motivation to develop substantial and informative results. Over the course of the past two months, we have gained a better grasp of the potential waste impacts occurring within the Fine Arts Café as well as the aggregate amounts of waste produced from everyday customers. Our initial hopes primarily focused on achieving substantial results that could curb wasteful habits within the café as well as the University of Virginia community. To raise student and staff awareness of more sustainable food options and habits, we designed marketing posters, a presentation within the Architecture School, and worked in coordination with the Green Dining student advocates to use the Observatory Hill flat screen television monitors and table tents to publicize our results. Lastly, after confronting a few initial challenges following the first waste audit, we have reorganized our project aim to advocate the use of re-usable to-go containers within dining facilities on grounds. Most importantly, we have maintained focus on our ultimate goal throughout this process, which is to create a more sustainable, less wasteful and therefore more cost-effective environment within the Fine Arts Café. Secondary goals included analyzing the Fine Arts Café’s inventory costs and operation system to pinpoint new potential for efficiency improvement and develop ways to reduce the everyday food and packaging waste produced. Our project definition has evolved to encompass new challenges and innovative ideas that our team has worked through alongside our mentors. Besides determining the amount of trash and waste produced from the café, we also hope to limit wasteful customer habits and encourage alternative solutions that are inherently “greener” and sustainable. We have developed ways to approach this issue, which can be found detailed later in the report.

Waste_Audit_FAcafe_2011