Every year, our Impact Report gives us an opportunity to stop, look back and ask a fairly simple question: are the changes we are making actually making a difference?

As a growing family business, our environmental and social impact is not static. More visitors, more products and more varied activity inevitably affect the resources we use. This year, we have therefore continued to improve not only what we measure, but how we use that information to make decisions.

Our reporting now brings together energy, water, waste, organic sales, carbon, education, community engagement and team wellbeing. Increasingly, we are also looking at these figures relative to the size of the business, rather than relying solely on absolute reductions.

Here are some of the highlights from 2025/26.

Energy and renewables

Across our two main business sites, Mersley and Langbridge, we used 132,995 kWh of grid electricity during the year. Alongside this, our solar panels generated 140,730 kWh — meaning we generated slightly more solar electricity than the amount of electricity we purchased from the grid. Solar accounted for around 51% of our combined grid electricity and solar generation.

Our biomass systems also provided 353,560 kWh of renewable heat, helping us reduce our reliance on fossil fuels for heating. We continue to produce as much of our own fuel for our log burners from our managed woodlands.

Energy remains an area where we are continually learning. Rather than looking only at whether total consumption rises or falls, we are increasingly measuring energy use relative to turnover so that we can understand whether the business is becoming more efficient as it grows.

Water

We used 11,560 m³ of water across the business during the year, equivalent to 185 m³ per £100,000 of turnover. This was an increase on the previous year, alongside increased activity across the farm, including more cattle, the new market garden and the addition of the sauna and plunge pool. It is a good example of why we are increasingly measuring resource use alongside business activity, helping us better understand not just how much we use, but why.

Water has become an increasingly important focus for us, particularly following an exceptionally dry spring and summer. At the Garlic Lovers' Garden we have been looking at ways to make better use of water already available on the farm and to build greater resilience into how we grow food.

Waste: knowing more so we can waste less

Improving the quality of our waste data has been an important piece of work this year. We monitor waste across our Mersley and Langbridge sites and this year achieved a combined 61% of waste diverted from landfill, exceeding our 60% target. We have also continued to weigh raw vegetable preparation waste from our restaurant kitchen, helping us better understand and manage food waste at source.

Since recording recommenced in March 2026, 537.7 kg of raw kitchen preparation waste has been diverted into our on-site composting system, returning those nutrients to the soil rather than treating them simply as waste.

There is still plenty to do. Better segregation, reducing waste at source and understanding exactly what is leaving the business will remain priorities for the coming year.

Continuing our transition to organic

Our organic range continues to grow, with 18 of our 85 products now converted to organic. We are continuing this transition across the range, with the longer-term ambition of making all our products organic.

This is not simply a carbon project. Our reasons for choosing organic include soil health, biodiversity, reduced reliance on synthetic inputs and the wider resilience of our food system.

However, carbon measurement has helped inform the process. Our Scope 3 work showed just how much of our wider footprint sits within our supply chain, prompting us to look more closely at the ingredients we buy and how they are produced.

Carbon: measurement as a tool, not the end goal

Our 2021/22 Scope 3 assessment estimated 2,851.6 tonnes CO₂e across our value chain. Of this, 86.6% — 2,469.3 tonnes — came from purchased goods and services.

That was important because it showed us that, while reducing electricity, water, waste and transport all matters, some of our greatest opportunities for change lie further upstream in our products and supply chain.

In 2025 we also used the Farm Carbon Toolkit to look specifically at the farming operation. It estimated annual farm emissions of 190.91 tCO₂e and carbon removals of 552.69 tCO₂e, giving an estimated farm carbon balance of –361.77 tCO₂e.

We are deliberately cautious with this number. It does not mean we claim The Garlic Farm as a whole is carbon negative. The farm assessment and our wider business carbon footprint have different boundaries and measure different things.

For us, carbon measurement is useful when it helps us understand where our impact occurs and informs better decisions — not simply because it gives us another number to report.

Growing food — and reconnecting people with it

One of the biggest developments this year has been the Garlic Lovers' Garden, our organic market garden created to grow food for our restaurant while providing a place for education, experimentation and community involvement.

Alongside producing food for the kitchen, the garden has welcomed school groups, home-educated children, SEND groups, young farmers, university students and community organisations. Our records include 606 education and community participants during the year, alongside an apprenticeship placement running from March to July 2026.

The garden is still very much a work in progress. Whilst it has provided more than 157kg of organic vegetables to the restaurant and welcomed 11 educational groups, it is also somewhere we can experiment with growing, composting, soil health, water, biodiversity and the relationship between a kitchen and the land that feeds it — and share what we learn as we go.

People and wellbeing

Our impact is about people as much as resources.

This year we continued our commitment to the Real Living Wage and maintained a dedicated £2,000 team wellbeing budget, supporting activities including nutrition, stress-management and financial-planning workshops.

We also continue to use our Team Satisfaction Questionnaire to understand how people experience working here and where we can improve. The point is not simply to have policies in place, but to keep listening and responding and hopefully, improving the experience of working with us for our team members and community.

Still learning, still improving

August marked three years since The Garlic Farm became a certified B Corp, although our B Corp journey began back in 2019.

Perhaps the biggest change over that time has been our approach to measurement. We have better data than we did three years ago — but we are also increasingly conscious that measuring impact is only worthwhile if it leads to action.

There are areas where we have made significant progress and others where the data tells us we have more work to do. We don't expect sustainability to have a finish line.

As we prepare for our next B Corp recertification under the new standards, our focus remains on measuring what is useful, learning from what we find and using it to make better decisions for our farm, our business, our team and our community.

This is only a snapshot of our year. You can read our full Impact Report here.