esg at toast

Environment,
Social &
Governance at
Toast

Our purpose at Toast is to enrich the food experience for all. We bake sustainability, social impact, and equity into our business strategy, operations, and products. The ultimate goal? To help our employees, our industry, our communities, and our environment to thrive.

ESG priorities

Integrating ESG into our strategy helps us deliver on our mission to help the restaurant community thrive. It also enhances our efforts to serve core stakeholders including restaurants, communities, nature, and our Toasters. We prioritize and report on the five focus areas below.

Esg priorities
  • Ethical and transparent business practices
  • Privacy and security protections
  • Diversity, equity, and inclusion
  • Environmental footprint
  • Toast as a force for positive social and environmental impact

2023 highlights

$4.9M+

in retail value of food waste logged using Toast Food Waste Reduction (FWR) feature in 2023.

$39M+

in Toast stock contributions1 to the Toast.org Impact Fund since 2021.

Net-zero

Second consecutive year achieving net-zero emissions from electricity across our workspaces.

#17

on Glassdoor’s 2024 Best Places to Work List.

Restaurant enablement

Toast is used by over 100,000 restaurant locations, and Toast.org solutions are uniquely designed to help restaurants benefit their communities and reduce their environmental impact.

Img toast esg rx enablement
Helping restaurants manage and reduce food waste

Our Food Waste Reduction (FWR) product feature, available to all Toast customers at no additional cost, is designed to help restaurants measure and manage food waste in their operations.


Making community support easier

We provide tools to help restaurants raise funds to support their communities and deepen their guest engagement via Toast Fundraising tools integrated into the POS.


Preventing single-use item waste in to-go orders

With the Takeout and Delivery Packaging Preferences feature, restaurants can customize which items (utensils, condiments) are automatically included in orders to help reduce waste.


Reducing packaging waste   

Toast’s integration with DeliverZero helps reduce waste from single-use packaging through a returnable, reusable container system for takeout and delivery.

1M+

Restaurant food waste items logged using the Toast Food Waste Reduction (FWR) feature in 2023.

$1.7M+

in charitable giving contributed by restaurant guests through the Toast fundraising feature in 2023.

21,000+

uses of reusable takeout packaging through our DeliverZero integration in 2023.

Community engagement and social impact

Through our philanthropic and community-focused social impact initiatives, we strive to enrich the food experience for all while supporting a healthier, more sustainable, and equitable world.

Esg community social impact
Toast.org philanthropy and people

Toast.org, our social impact arm, embodies our mission of enriching the food experience for all. Through grants, employee giving, and volunteering, we address global issues such as food insecurity and food waste.


Toast for nonprofit restaurants

Toast.org offers discounts on hardware and software to nonprofit restaurants, enabling them to advance their impact-driven missions and continue to scale and grow using Toast tools at lower costs.


Our Pledge 1%

As part of Toast’s Pledge 1% equity commitment, we contribute stock toward our Toast.org Impact Fund. Since 2021, Toast has donated approximately $39M in total fair market value of stock to the Toast.org Impact Fund1.


Our partnerships in action

Explore Toast.org's newsroom

59%

of Toasters participated in our employee matching gifts and donation rewards programs in 2023.

$3.4M

total charitable cash contributions from Toast, Toast.org Impact Fund, and Toasters in 2023.

200+

Toast.org-organized volunteer events in 2023.

Environmental sustainability

A healthy environment is a vital ingredient for a resilient food industry. We prioritize environmental sustainability across our business, and develop products and solutions to help our customers do the same.

Environmental sustainability
Achieving net-zero workplace electricity emissions

We invest in energy efficiency and procure renewable energy, purchasing Energy Attribute Certificates (EACs) equivalent to our grid electricity consumption in markets where we are unable to purchase green power through utility contracts.


Tracking our greenhouse gas emissions

We have completed and disclosed our full Scope 1, 2, and 3 greenhouse gas emissions since 2021, receiving external assurance for our Scope 1 and 2 emissions for 2022 and 2023.


Assessing climate risks and opportunities

We fully integrated climate risk and opportunities into our risk management and ESG strategy after completing a Task Force on Climate-Related Disclosure (TCFD)-aligned climate-risk assessment in FY23.


Responsibly recycling hardware

We engage third-party recyclers with zero-waste commitments to responsibly recycle Toast hardware. Please see our Hardware Recycling page for details. 

100%

renewable electricity commitment for our workplaces.

6

of our eight office buildings are LEED certified as of year-end 2023.

49%

of retired hardware recycled for free during our 2023 pilot.

Creating a workplace where everyone can thrive

Toasters are at the heart of our success, so we work to attract, retain, and advance top talent. We support the growth, wellness, and career aspirations of Toasters so they can thrive in and out of the workplace.

Thriving workplace
Working at Toast

We strive to ensure all Toasters feel supported and respected at work, and empowered to reach their full potential. Our Toast Values guide how we work and are reinforced through equitable policies, programs, and processes.


Making diversity, equity & inclusion a core focus

We prioritize DEI at Toast through inclusive hiring, learning experiences, and equitable opportunities for our employees to help them thrive and shape the future of our industry. See our DEI page for more.


Ethics and integrity

Toast’s Code of Business Conduct & Ethics defines minimum expectations for ethical conduct at Toast, and is supplemented by our Prohibiting Harassment & Discrimination Policy, Community Philosophy and other policies.


Privacy and security

We are committed to implementing security controls and data privacy standards to responsibly manage stakeholder information. Our Privacy Statement outlines how Toast manages the majority of the personal information we collect. 

97%

of people managers underwent unconscious bias training in 2023.

45%

of women hold leadership roles in 2023, up from 42% in 2022.

91%

of Toasters report being happy at Toast in 2023.2

2022 Q2 Bar Mezzana 20211006 53 1
All reports

Read the full report


We report on our ESG commitments, initiatives, and progress annually via our annual ESG report. Our disclosures are based on internationally recognized sustainability reporting standards and frameworks and are aligned to the interests of our stakeholders.

Learn more about ESG at Toast

We post additional ESG resources that underpin our sustainability 

commitments in action, such as key policies and supplementary disclosures,

on our ESG Investor Relations webpage.

1. Value estimated based on the fair market value of the stock on the date of contribution.
2. Based on a Q4 2023 survey answered by 84% of Toast employees.