Food and Beverage, a drain on resources or a regenerative lever?

Adam and Bumjoo Maclennan argue that food & beverage is not a low-margin nuisance but the beating heart – and biggest lever – of regenerative hospitality. By shifting sourcing toward regenerative agriculture, empowering chefs as tastemakers, and designing menus that prioritise soil health, biodiversity, and zero waste, hotels can turn every meal into a catalyst for healthier ecosystems, communities, and guests.

Adam MaclennanBumjoo Maclennan

Food and beverage.

What comes to mind?

Read the full article on hotelyearbook.com

The Hotel Yearbook 2026 - Sustainability Edition

The HYB 2026 The Regenerative Question: What Hospitality Must Become tackles regenerative hospitality's fundamental tensions. Moving beyond sustainability buzzwords, contributors will explore three perspectives: purists advocating holistic living-systems approaches; realists demanding measurable frameworks for accountability and scalability; and strategists seeking pragmatic balance between transformation and implementation. This edition serves as a critical forum to interrogate the divides, identify synergies, and define actionable pathways forward. By convening industry experts, researchers, and entrepreneurs, we transform contested concepts into constructive dialogue and, ultimately, clarifying what regenerative hospitality authentically is and isn't.

My career in hospitality began in food and beverage and operations management almost 30 years ago. I joined PKF in 2008 in Atlanta, GA, USA and am a partner of PKF hospitality Group Head of UK & Ireland. I have a deep understanding of the dynamics that drive performance and value in hospitality businesses throughout their life cycle.

As an unconventional food-systems change activist and documentary filmmaker with a 20-year experience in hospitality and investment, I am passionate about using food as solutions to today’s biodiversity, social and public health crises. I’ve dedicated six years of my post-corporate career to interdisciplinary research for our documentary film.

The PKF hospitality group is an internationally recognised leader in hospitality consulting. With a team of more than 100 consultants in 20 offices on all continents and an experience of almost 100 years, the PKF hospitality group offers focused consulting services for hotel, serviced living, tourism & leisure investments – including feasibility studies, valuations + appraisals, operator search, project development, financing + investment,...