As a vertically-integrated seafood and restaurant company and Certified B Corporation, Luke’s Lobster is committed to being a force for environmental and social good. Living up to this commitment starts with measuring our impact, setting goals to improve, pursuing clear strategies to achieve those goals, and reporting successes and failures transparently.
2024 Impact Report
Climate Change
In September of 2022, we completed the massive undertaking of measuring the carbon footprint of our entire lobster supply chain--the first time this has ever been measured in the lobster industry. And we committed not just to measuring it once, but to update that measurement to be more accurate every year.
🦞 In 2024, our carbon footprint stayed level at 3.13 pounds of GHG emissions for every pound of live lobster we purchase. While we reduced our footprint on transportation of our seafood by buying more offsets on shipping, and reduced our use of propane in our processing plant with the installation of heat pumps, we increased our footprint by opening new locations where our landlords controlled the electric bill, and we have not yet convinced them of the wisdom of sourcing only renewable energy as we do everywhere that we control. We will continue to pressure them to make the switch in 2025.
🦞 Conventional beef generates about 60 pounds of emissions for every pound of beef you eat. So every time you chose a 4 oz lobster roll over a quarter pounder in 2024, you generated 96% fewer greenhouse gas emissions.
🦞 Last year, we used 1,551,180 kwh of renewable energy, down from 1,773,339 kwh in 2023. We still buy 100% of electricity from renewable sources in all properties we control, so this means we were able to proactively reduce energy usage in our shacks and our production facility--that's a great thing, because even when using renewables, energy use puts a strain on the grid that we relieve when we conserve energy.
🦞 That said, because we buy renewables, we reduced our greenhouse gas emissions by 1,097 metric tons that we would have emitted if we just used the typical energy mix direct from the grid.
🦞 As we grew our shack footprint and experienced our first full year open in Seattle, we also increased the amount of seafood we shipped by UPS, and we offset the emissions from all those shipments, a total of 382 metric tons on 7,700 packages.
🦞 The solar panels on our Portland Pier wharf had their most productive year yet, generating 14,300 kwh of energy to power our flagship restaurant.
Waste Management
🦞 We continued our transition from landfill to-go ware to compostables, and this was the first year that more of these wares were compostable than not! We increased compostable usage by 42%, and decreased our non-compostable usage by 63%.
🦞 Our goals go beyond compostable conversion: we want to use fewer disposable wares, period. And this year we decreased that usage by 19%, by continuing to encourage our guests to dine in and use reusable plateware and utensils.
Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
Through our monthly Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion committee meetings, we've learned a lot about the challenges that folks from marginalized backgrounds face in our industry, even in our company. So in 2022, we implemented mandatory diversity, equity, and inclusion training for all of our managers to ensure they create a space for team members to show up and thrive as their authentic selves, and to be treated equitably.
🦞 We continued to train 100% of our new managers and new shack teammates on our diversity, equity, and inclusion practices that create a fair, level playing field both on our internal team, and for others in the food industry.
🦞 We used our purchasing power to support 18 women, BIPOC, and/or LGBTQ+-owned businesses this year, from Passamaquoddy Wild Blueberry Company who grows the blueberries for all our pies, to Sorel, who makes the liqueur for our Sea Smoke Cocktail, to Rhythm Brewing, the first Black woman-owned brewery in Connecticut, whose beer we proudly pour in Grand Central and Rockefeller Center.
🦞 Back home in Maine, we expanded Lift All Boats to teach 25 students from non-fishing backgrounds to lobster and maintain their student licenses--up from 4 students in 2022 and 18 in 2023! Two of our students worked significant time on the sterns of professional lobster boats as they explored lobstering as a full time career. This year, we'll be bringing 30 students on board for our biggest summer yet!
🦞 In 2024, these 25 students fished a total of 1482.5 hours and caught 1424 pounds of live lobster.
Growth and Promotions
🦞 We had 3 more exciting shack restaurant openings in 2024: our traditional smaller scale lobster shacks in Rockefeller Center, NYC, and Santa Monica (our first SoCal location!), and a full scale restaurant on MacMillan Pier in Provincetown, MA.
🦞 We launched new grocery products at our hometown grocer, Hannaford Supermarkets, as well as Food Lion and Stew Leonards.
🦞 As we celebrate all this exciting growth, we're proudest of the fact that our whole team is winning together: in 2024 we internally promoted 42 members of the Luke's team!