WindsorEats turns green and chooses the best weapon against climate change

WindsorEats has become the first partner with the Essex Region Conservation Authority in a new sustainable initiative.

WindsorEats will donate two per cent of their tour package tickets sales to support local tree planting efforts. 

Along with donating, WindsorEats is also going to give a raise to their employees to reach a more sustainable living wage. 

Gordon Orr, CEO of the Tourism Windsor-Essex-Pelee Island, said the local business is not only investing in their own human capital, but also giving back to the community.   

“We represent a number of different tourism stakeholders and partners that deliver their own experiences. So, I know that sustainability is very topical,” said Orr. “These little changes will have a much bigger imprint going forward.” 

The Partners in Sustainability initative is a flexible model whereby businesses can contribute to tree planting based on what works within the scope of their own business operations.  

“After enduring several severe climate-induced weather incidents that hampered our tourism season in 2019, including flooded waterfronts that postponed our iconic Dinner on a Pier event, WindsorEats is officially ensuring our focus is on a Triple Bottom Line,” said WindsorEats co-owner Adriano Ciotoli on the company’s website. 

According to Investopedia, triple bottom line is a theory which sees businesses focus on both social and environmental concerns, along with profits.  

ERCA is receiving an increasing numbers of requests from businesses on how they could make a local impact in reducing their environmental footprint. Every ticket WindsorEats sells to one of our experiences will now include a contribution to ERCA. This lead to developing the idea of Partners in Sustainability.

“We’ve had businesses who have chosen to plant trees based on how much paper they use, some that wish to plant trees to compensate for energy consumption, and some, like WindsorEats, who are contributing based on a percentage of revenues generated,” said Stuebing, adding the idea is for it to be simple, yet impactful.

The United Nations recommends that any bioregion should consist of at least 12 per cent of natural area coverage in order to be healthy and sustainable. Environment Canada’s recommendation is much higher at 35 per cent. Windsor reaches neither of these.

“Our region has one of the lowest amounts of tree cover in Canada – only 8.5 per cent of our region is in a natural state,” said Stuebing.  

WindsorEats is currently the only business in the program.

“It doesn’t have to be your big, multi-million dollar or billion-dollar corporations that make this these changes. It can be very much grass roots and can be small business,” said Orr.  

Orr said he is hopeful about other businesses joining and recognizing that sustainability is important for the future. TWEPI will address sustainability efforts at their upcoming general meeting in June.