10 years of driving progress: celebrate – and keep going!

March has always been a bumper month for Rubies in the Rubble. Food Waste Action Week, B Corp Month, and International Women’s Day – all championing progress we are making within the food industry.

Rewinding back to when we started Rubies, 10 years ago, food waste was not even a recognised issue, let alone understood. Therefore, as a pioneer in this space, educating about our mission was initially a full-time job.

Today, however – thanks to the hard work of the Rubies team and many other SMEs, corporates and governmental bodies – food waste is now one of the primary environmental concerns for UK shoppers. Change always takes brave moves and one standout moment for food waste awareness was in 2013, when Tesco boldly published its food waste figures. It faced public shock and outcry… but led to a call for widespread reporting across supermarkets.

As for B Corps, they didn’t exist when I founded Rubies either. B Corp was established in the US in 2006 before reaching the UK in 2014. There are now over 1,900 UK B Corps, all committed to using business as a force for good.

International Women’s Day has gone from strength to strength, giving a huge cheer to all the great women working from farm to fork – breaking cultural norms and setting new role models for generations to come.

Change is happening within the food industry through the choices we all make in business. As an entrepreneur, it is this change that gets me out of bed. We all have the ability to make change, no matter what our position in business.

At Rubies, we are always encouraging the team to better their area – from sourcing, manufacturing and deliveries to team culture or hiring. We believe not only does this empower everyone to make an impact to people, planet and profit, but it also keeps us entrepreneurial and hopefully striving to set new standards.

Over the years, this has led to various waste partnerships, deliveries by bike to customers including Marriott Hotels, monitoring our carbon footprint impact, team charity days and blind hiring processes.

We can only hope for another 10 years of positive changes – we plan never to lose the passion and energy to drive change. Well done to everyone for all your hard work.