As the Head of Energy Management at Mitchells & Butlers, Richard Felgate was one of the largest multisite retailers in the UK and certainly an industry leader in the pubs & restaurants sector. Richard started from scratch transforming energy from being a cost that the business just incurred, to being one of the biggest opportunities for profit within the P&L. Along the way, there was a transformation in the energy efficiency of the 1,500 buildings in the estate, a big behavioural and cultural change with the 40,000 employees and the creation of a hugely capable team. It wasn’t easy and there were the regular challenges of gaining board support, securing funding and convincing the sceptics, but the results were impressive, multi million pound annual savings and relative energy reduction of over 20%.