Overall Rating	Silver - expired
Overall Score	50.03
Liaison	Mike Evans
Submission Date	May 28, 2019
Executive Letter	Download

STARS v2.1

Williams College
OP-7: Food and Beverage Purchasing

Status	Score	Responsible Party
	0.79 / 6.00	Mike Evans Assistant Director Zilkha Center

"---" indicates that no data was submitted for this field

This credit requires:

A completed STARS Food and Beverage Purchasing Inventory,
An itemized inventory based on output from the Real Food Calculator, or
An alternative inventory that includes for each product:

Product vendor
Product label/brand
Product description
The category in which the product qualifies (Third Party Verified or Local & Community Based)
Information justifying inclusion: the standards met if the product is third party verified; ownership, size, distance, production methods for Local & Community Based products

Part 1

Third Party Verified and Community Based Products

Percentage of dining services food and beverage expenditures on products that are third party verified under one or more recognized food and beverage sustainability standards or Local & Community-Based:

Part 2

Animal Products

Does the institution wish to pursue Part 2 of this credit (expenditures on conventional animal products)? (If data is not available, respond “No”):

Yes

Percentage of total dining services food and beverage expenditures on conventional animal products (meat, poultry, fish/seafood, eggs, and dairy products that do NOT qualify in either the Third Party Verified or Local & Community-Based category):

Food and Beverage Purchasing Inventory

Required if pursuing either part of the credit:

A brief description of the sustainable food and beverage purchasing program, including how the sustainability impacts of products in specific categories are addressed (e.g. meat, poultry, fish/seafood, eggs, dairy, produce, tea/coffee):

For the last several years, Williams College has focused on increasing the amount of sustainable food that is purchased and served on campus. These changes have come from trainings in plant based meals from the Humane Society's Forward Food trainings and from a commitment to reducing industrial beef by 50%. Students have completed the Real Food Calculator and are using the product inventories to target specific products that have more sustainable alternatives in a similar price range. The future of the sustainable food and beverage purchasing program promises to be a hybrid of sustainable purchasing, which often increases budget expenditure, and ecologically-conscious eating habits, which does not necessarily constitute a budget increase and could very well lower costs.

An inventory of the institution’s sustainable food and beverage purchases that includes for each product: the description/type; label, brand or producer; and the category in which it is being counted and/or a description of its sustainability attribute(s):

Williams17-18_Real_Food_Calculator.xlsx

A brief description of the methodology used to conduct the inventory, including the timeframe and how representative samples accounted for seasonal variation (if applicable):

C-BORD, the menu management software used by Williams Dining, tracks all food items (ingredients) individually. In 2014, C-BORD introduced a sustainability tracking component, which Williams Dining has now fully implemented in cooperation with the Zilkha Center for Environmental Initiatives. Food items are tagged according to over 30 sustainability attributes, as outlined by the Real Food Guide of the Real Food Challenge (http://www.realfoodchallenge.org/sites/g/files/g809971/f/201403/Real%20Food%20Guide%20Version%201.0%20March%202014_0.pdf). As new items are added to the database, the manager of the sustainable food program evaluates them individually according to these sustainability criteria and tags them as such. This system allows for real-time reports on sustainability purchasing overall, as well as in reference to specific product attributes.

If uploading output from the Real Food Calculator, provide:

Percentage of total dining services expenditures on Real Food A (0-100):

Percentage of total dining services expenditures on Real Food B (0-100):

Required if pursuing either part of the credit:

Which of the following food service providers are present on campus and included in the total food and beverage expenditure figures?:

	Present?	Included?
Dining operations and catering services operated by the institution	Yes	Yes
Dining operations and catering services operated by a contractor	Yes	Yes
Student-run food/catering services	Yes	No
Franchises (e.g. national or global brands)	No	No
Convenience stores	No	No
Vending services	Yes	No
Concessions	Yes	No

Optional Fields

A brief description of purchased food and beverage products that have other sustainability attributes not recognized above :

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Additional percentage of dining services food and beverage expenditures on conventional products with other sustainability attributes not recognized above (0-100) :

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The website URL where information about the programs or initiatives is available:

https://sustainability.williams.edu/food

Additional documentation to support the submission:

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Data source(s) and notes about the submission:

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The information presented here is self-reported. While AASHE staff review portions of all STARS reports and institutions are welcome to seek additional forms of review, the data in STARS reports are not verified by AASHE. If you believe any of this information is erroneous or inconsistent with credit criteria, please review the process for inquiring about the information reported by an institution or simply email your inquiry to stars@aashe.org.