Fort Lauderdale, Florida-based Pizza Fusion is an organic restaurant franchisor that preaches (and practices) sustainability at all level of its operations, which since the start of 2007 have expanded outside of Florida to New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Colorado. The company’s corporate slogan is “Pizza Fusion: Saving the Earth, One Pizza at a Time,” and it’s about to combine its progressive green business practices with green building principles, announcing last week that it will open its first LEED-certified restaurant in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida in the fourth quarter of 2007. A second LEED-certified branch will follow in Philadelphia; the Palm Beach Gardens location will be the first LEED-certified restaurant in Florida, offering green design features that include building-integrated photovoltaic panels, a 120 square foot glass wall made from reused soda bottles, ceiling panels made from seventy-four percent recycled aluminum cans and twenty-four percent post-industrial metals, and seat cushions made from soybean oil. The Palm Beach Gardens project team includes Square One Architecture, interior designer Casa Conde, TLC Engineering, and green product consultant Eco-$mart.
Pizza Fusion delivers its pies in hybrid vehicles, gives patrons discounts for returning boxes for recycling, provides its staff with eco-friendly uniforms, stocks its stores with plates and utensils that decompose in a scant fifty days, and purchases wind energy certificates that completely offset all of its energy consumption. Founded in 2006, the company anticipates that it will operate 40 restaurants by the close of the fourth quarter, and 150 by 2010. Definitely keep an eye out for Pizza Fusion- and other businesses just as committed to the same sustainable mission.
Kudos to the originators of Pizza Fusion!
As a resident of New York, where great pizza is a tradition, and a member of the USGBC this represents utopia for me!
Opening up 40 franchises in 4 states in such a short period of time is certainly, as Radny Romano says “a sign of the times”. I would like to know (honestly) of another business that does ALL of the following:
1) is a franchise, which means other like-minded people can also own the same type of business 2) uses renewable energy, 3) builds LEED certified buildings to house its operations, 4) uses hybrid vehicles, 5) has its own education program for children, 6) uses organic ingredients, 7) uses biodegradable utensils and 8) gives customers a discount for returning used pizza boxes! WOW! These folks are certainly ahead of the curve and seem to have mastered the “cradle to cradle” concept.
By eating at Pizza Fusion I have the opportunity to do something healthy for myself and the environment!
I hope one opens in NY soon. ‘Till then I will definitely tell my friends about this place and gather them together for a road trip to Philly so we can see for ourselves!
Thanks for providing this info Celsias!