A TASTE
OF HOPE

We want to run a business that’s as sustainable as possible – which is why we’re measuring our impact.

An Award Winning Circular Solution

We’re so proud to have been recognised by industry experts in 2022 and 2021, by winning the Innovation Award at Tamaki Makaurau Zero Waste Awards and Going Circular Award at the Sustainable Business Network Awards. Plus, winning in partnership with our mates at With Wild and BurgerFuel, Communicating Impact at the Sustainable Business Network Awards.

Bread Rescued and Plastic Bags Upcycled

Every can or pint of Citizen beer uses the fermentable sugars from one slice of rescued fresh surplus bread that would otherwise have gone to waste or low value stock feed. Slice by slice, it adds up. So far we’ve upcycled over 500,000 slices of bread and counting. And, repurposing this unsold bread from going to waste has prevented circa 46,375 kgs CO2. Sip by sip, it all adds up to a positive impact!

We also upcycle the plastic bread bags that we receive the unsold fresh supermarket bread into fenceposts thanks to our mates at Future Post – so far we’ve prevented circa 25,000 plastic bags going to landfill!

Brewing A Positive Impact

Reducing food waste is just part of the story. Because we use unsold fresh bread in our brews, this also has the added benefit reducing the need for up to a quarter of the virgin barley in each of our brews.

Plus, at the end of our bread-brews, we repurpose our bread-brew mash to create a nutritious, malty, spent-grain flour, which in turn we use to bake bread. Our tasty spent-grain sourdough replaces 10% of standard white flour, which again reduces the need for primary ingredient production, and creates a circular solution to food waste. From Bread into Beer into Bread.

Fighting Food Waste With BurgerFuel

We’ve been ‘chipping away’ with our mates at BurgerFuel over the last 12 months, helping them consciously craft some tasty rescued food solutions… including our Wild Heart collaboration (Finalist in Sustainability Business Network for Communicating Impact 2022).

Developed in partnership with the team at With Wild & BurgerFuel, this burger is packed with purpose, including rescued Central Otago cherries, wonky Pukekohe carrots and Fiordland Wapiti venison thanks to our mates at With Wild.

Citizen & BurgerFuel also created a rescued cherry cola, that was launched with the burger – each can saves 29 cherries from going to waste. And when combined with the cherry sauce in the burger, we upcycled over 1m cherries to date.

Plus, the Wild Heart burger promotion raised $30,000 which has been invested in 55 new stoat traps that have been installed in the famous Nitz Valley, Fiordland National Park – helping to protect our precious native birds.

Rescuing Central Otago Cherries

Aotearoa, New Zealand has an incredible reputation for delicious, export quality cherries, but what happens to the wonky or rain damaged cherries??

That’s why Citizen partnered with NZ Cherry Corp, one of NZs best cherry growers located in Central Otago. Our shared aim is to prevent all cherries from going to waste by finding ways to upcycle them into cherry beverages that not only taste great but are great for the planet!

First, we started with our delicious ‘Cherry Bomb Cider’ created with our mates at Morningcider (each 440ml can upcycles 32 cherries). Then we launched our Citizen Cherry Cola, developed in collaboration with our mates at Burgerfuel (each 330ml can upcycles 29 cherries). To date we’ve saved over 1.5m cherries. But we have more cherry beverages launching this year. So, by simply enjoying one of our rescued cherry beverages, you can be a cherry saving hero!

Toward Net Zero Emissions

We’re committed to running a low impact business. Thanks to the Toitū Carbon Assess platform, we were able to calculate our carbon emissions – which is a great tool for a small business. In our first year, we offset unavoidable carbon emissions for Citizen by supporting native forest restoration projects. We’re currently calculating our footprint for 2022!

Making Good, Joyful - Our New Campaign!

Fun fact: Every Citizen beer you drink saves a slice of bread from being buried in a bin, pecked at by pigeons, or worst of all, seeing out its days on the scrapheap. Which is definitely something to smile about. Especially if you’re a slice of bread.

Citizen rescues edible food waste and turns it into delicious food and beverages. Our craft beer is made using unsold supermarket bread.

The food waste crisis is huge, poorly understood and hard to quantify. What does 540,000 tonnes of waste mean to a consumer? And buying ‘ethical’ often comes with a perception of sacrificing quality and taste. As a result, most don’t do it. 64% of people want to buy ethical. Only 27% do.

So, we focused on the small difference citizens can make every time they have a beer.

Our job was to get Kiwis to see drinking Citizen as an easy, tasty way to do good and make a difference.

Introducing our campaign ‘Happy Bread’