Sustainability in business has too often been reduced to a checklist: recycling bins, LED lighting,
low-flow taps. Yet what truly drives meaningful change is not the hardware; it is the people.

That is the premise behind the Leaf Mark™ Certification, Ireland’s new sustainability
accreditation created by Fifty Shades Greener.

Earlier this month, the Mespil Hotel in Dublin became the first organisation in the country to
achieve the top-tier “Three Leaves” status under this programme. It is a milestone worth
celebrating, not just for the hotel, but for what it signals about the future of corporate
responsibility in Ireland.

A certification that starts with people

Unlike traditional environmental certifications that assess systems and infrastructure, the Leaf
Mark™ puts people front and centre. It recognises businesses that invest in sustainability
education for their teams, embedding knowledge, awareness, and accountability into the fabric
of daily operations.

As Fifty Shades Greener founder Raquel Noboa explains, “Sustainability transformation begins
with education.” The Leaf Mark™ was designed to measure how deeply sustainability learning
has been integrated into a company’s culture, using a three-tier scale — One Leaf, Two Leaves,
and Three Leaves — corresponding to the depth and reach of employee training.

This focus on education is not symbolic. It is strategic. Empowering staff to understand why
sustainability matters, and how their everyday actions contribute, creates lasting behavioural
change that no compliance audit alone can achieve.

Mespil Hotel: from green vision to green culture

The Mespil Hotel’s sustainability journey exemplifies this transformation. As Assistant HR &
Sustainability Manager Jason Conlon recounts in his case study, the hotel’s approach started
with small, achievable steps: energy and waste monitoring, improved communication, and a
shared vision for greener operations. But the real shift came when the staff themselves became
part of the process.

Through Online Green Skills training, employees across departments, from front desk to
housekeeping, learned how to make sustainability part of their daily work. “It’s not just about
saving energy or reducing waste,” Conlon notes, “it’s about changing mindsets.”

This people-first approach led the Mespil Hotel to achieve the Three Leaves recognition, the
highest possible under the Leaf Mark™ system. Conlon describes it as “a reflection of our
commitment to building a culture of sustainability and ensuring every team member has the
skills to make a positive environmental impact.”

Beyond compliance: a blueprint for a greener economy

The Leaf Mark™ arrives at a critical time for Ireland’s hospitality sector, which faces growing
pressure to meet environmental targets while maintaining service excellence. What the
programme offers is a blueprint for systemic change, one that begins not in the boardroom, but
in the staff room.

By linking environmental goals to professional development, the Leaf Mark™ positions
sustainability as both an ethical and economic imperative. It rewards organisations that invest
in their people, recognising that informed employees are not only more responsible, but also
more engaged and innovative.

A new standard for a new era

In a landscape crowded with eco-labels, the Leaf Mark™ stands out because it does not just
measure impact, it creates it. Its message is simple but profound: when employees understand
sustainability, they live it.

As Ireland continues its green transition, the Mespil Hotel’s achievement should inspire other
organisations to follow suit. Sustainability is not a one-time project or PR statement; it is a
shared learning journey. And thanks to the Leaf Mark™, that journey now has a clear, and
human-centred, path forward.