THE ART OF SAVING THE PLANET - PETROU STYLE
Petrou Bros, national Fish and Chip Shop of the Year 2006, has come up with a novel way of inspiring customers to save the planet with the help of trusty sauce pod, Heinz SqueezMe!
The shop in Chatteris, Cambridgeshire, gives a five pence discount on SqueezMe! if customers return their empty pods, which are either recycled or used in a mystery sculpture being crafted by local artist Richard Savage, who runs a studio above Mark Petrou's pub, The Honest John in South Park Street.
Richard made a bit of a name for himself in the Chatteris area by painting false fronts on derelict buildings. These included Arkwrights from Open All Hours, with Ronnie Barker and David Jason going about their grocery business, and an estate agent called 'Norfolk and Good'.
Mark Petrou says the SqueezMe! initiative provided food for thought for customers, saved them money and demonstrated that the Fish & Chip trade was doing its bit for the environment.
"I was inspired while on holiday with my wife in Wales back in March. We'd been to the Centre for Alternative Technology and I started thinking about how we handle our waste. Since then, we have operated on the three Rs - Reduce, Re-use, Recycle. We separate waste for composting, recycle, where possible, and are in the process of phasing out our plastic carrier bags for brown paper bags, and replacing plastic forks for cornstarch forks that go back to nature in landfill within two months.
"In terms of SqueezMe!, we wanted to encourage customers to recycle the packaging and thought a five pence discount might do it, which is proving popular, particularly with those who separate their waste and try to make savings at home to be in harmony with the planet.
"We clean and butterfly most of them and take them to the plastic bottle bank, but many go to Richard for his mystery piece of art. I did suggest to him that the pods looked a bit like fish scales, which might be a clue, but for now he's keeping it firmly under wraps. He could even unveil it at the Fish and Chip Shop of the Year, but we'll have to see."
