A close up of two people clinking reusable coffee cups outside a campus building

Our sustainable mission

Find out about how we're helping the planet

Catering offers the chance to address a range of sustainability issues. While we aim to provide food that’s healthy, affordable, local, seasonal and nutritious — with plant-based alternatives where possible — we’re also looking to eradicate single-use packaging, cut food waste and reduce both our energy and water consumption.

Read our Sustainable Food Policy‌, which provides a framework to ensure that food and drink is produced, sourced, consumed and disposed of in such a way that considers the protection of the environment, provides benefit for society and that sets high standards of animal welfare.

  • Food made good

    We are a two-star member of Food Made Good — an organisation dedicated to making every meal served as sustainable as possible.

    In 2022, we achieved a two-star “excellent” rating from the Sustainable Restaurant Association (SRA) Food Made Good award scheme, which measures our practices across sourcing, society and the environment.

  • Less plastic waste

    Manchester Met, along with a host of partners across Greater Manchester, successfully eradicated single-use plastics in 2022/23 as part of the PlasticFreeGM campaign.

    Here are some of the steps we have taken, or plan to take across catering and hospitality to act on this pledge going forward.

    • Removed disposable plastic straws and cutlery in all catering outlets
    • Removed non-recyclable black plastic food trays and replaced with recyclable cardboard containers with biodegradable lids in our hospitality offer
    • Offer a 20p discount for using a reusable cup for hot drinks, thereby discouraging the use of single-use plastic-lined disposable cups.
    • Sell reusable ‘Bottle Up’ water bottles to reduce the consumption of single-use plastic bottles
    • Replaced plastic takeaway food boxes with boxes & packaging made from recycled materials

  • Water

    We provide students, staff and visitors with access to free drinking water in all buildings.

    We are actively working to reduce the consumption of single-use plastics by encouraging our students and staff to refill. Water fountains are available in the following locations across our campus.

  • Reuse and refill

    Drinks bottles

    We offer ‘Bottle Up’ water bottles for £3.00 in Costa, Art School and Birley Cafe. These bottles are made from sugar cane, reusable, and pre-filled with spring water. Customers can fill up their water bottles at the fountains located near the catering outlets. 

    Hot drinks discount

    We sell reusable cups for hot drinks in all of our catering outlets and provide some great incentives for using reusable cups. You can:

    • purchase a reusable cup and receive a hot drink free of charge upon purchase of the cup
    • purchase a hot drink using any reusable cup and receive a 20p discount on all hot drinks

  • Palm oil

    Small actions, big difference

    We’ve taken steps to ensure all our food and drink suppliers use either no palm oil or certified sustainable palm oil in all our products. For more information on sustainable palm oil, visit the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil.

  • Too Fresh to Throw Bags

    In Term 3 we trialled and launched our Too Fresh to Throw Bag initiative, which helps us reduce food waste on campus by selling unsold products to our customers for £2. 

    Customers can pick up sandwiches, wraps, cakes, or pastries that are no longer able to be sold in the outlet at the end of the day. 

Contact us

If there’s something we can help with, we would love to hear from you.

Simply email us at mill@mmu.ac.uk or get in touch via our social channels.

mill@mmu.ac.uk