For over a century, Hobbs House Bakery has been baking bread with care, craft and a deep sense of community in Chipping Sodbury — and now, with locations in Nailsworth, Tetbury and Bristol, it has been granted the 2025 King’s Award for Enterprise in Sustainable Development.
From becoming a Certified B Corporation in 2019 to the introduction of electric delivery vehicles, solar panels, green energy and its 'zero bread to landfill' policy, the Gloucestershire bakery has been on a mission to become more sustainable.
One of only 27 UK businesses to receive this award and one of three in Gloucestershire and South Gloucestershire, the accolade recognises the bakery’s outstanding achievement in its sustainability work, which has been implemented in every area of the business — from sourcing, production and logistics to employment, resource use and waste reduction.
George Herbert, managing director at Hobbs House Bakery, said: 'Our team is delighted that the business has been granted the King’s Award. We are all on a journey to improve how we use resources responsibly, to produce good, tasty food sustainably and reduce the impact we make on our environment.'
On a mission to nourish people and communities for generations to come, the team implement their sustainable approach to business at every opportunity.
This includes the bakery’s aim to source 100 per cent of its grain from organic or regeneratively farmed land by 2032, nourishing its 170 employees and continuous training of new bakers through its apprenticeship programmes; investing in their development at the bakery to increase capacity for future growth and sending surplus bread to local community initiatives that tackle hunger.
George continued: 'We’re really proud to source our supplies as locally as possible and the majority of the companies we work with are within a 20-mile radius. Over the last decade we have significantly reduced our emissions by 22.9 per cent, meaning we are over halfway towards meeting our 10-year 42 per cent reduction target.
'Our business will continue to invest in and develop our processes to ensure our work is as sustainable as possible. The journey does not really have an end goal — as the business’s circumstances and our environment change, we will have to innovate to be the best for our people, community and environment.'
