As part of the collaboration, Punch, which operates about 1,300 pubs across the UK, is supporting a number of Eden initiatives that aim to increase biodiversity across Punch’s estate by helping to create new habitats for wildlife in its pub gardens and green spaces for communities to socialise.
While supporting the Eden Project’s ideals of people working with the natural world to benefit all living things, Punch is also focused on indirectly mitigating their residual emissions to help them on their journey to Net Zero.
Three initiatives
The partnership encompasses three key pillars:
• The Environment – Punch will participate in the National Wildflower Centre’s Biodiversity Scheme.
• Greening Gardens – Eden will provide training, tools and materials to encourage pubs to become ‘Pollinator Pubs’, creating sensory and accessible garden areas for customers to enjoy while boosting biodiversity.
• Community Hubs – working with Eden Project Communities programme, the partnership will centre on Eden’s flagship campaign The Big Lunch, which this year is an official part of the King’s coronation, as well as a range of social wellbeing ideas to further enhance Punch’s community ethos.
Punch Pubs & Co chief executive Clive Chesser said: “We are delighted to have teamed up with the Eden Project, which can truly help us when it comes to the social wellbeing of our communities, local impact and environmental footprint alongside our wider sustainability credentials.”
Bringing people together
Chesser continued: “We are committed to ‘Doing Well by Doing Good’, and this new partnership is doing just that, using the power of the local and pub gardens to bring people together and boost biodiversity.”
Eden Project chief purpose officer Peter Stewart LVO added: “As a former publican, I know pubs have long been a place where people have come together in our communities.
“We’re delighted to be working with Punch to explore how we bring more people together to make meaningful connection through our flagship campaign The Big Lunch and by creating community hubs that become accessible green spaces via our wildflower schemes in Punch locations. Together we’re exploring how by connecting people with each other and the natural world we can start to shape a better future.”
The partnership has begun in earnest, with a number of Punch’s pubs having already signed up for the Coronation Big Lunch (May 6-8), which is aimed at connecting people and communities while encouraging people to make positive change where they live.
