Forest Green Rovers, the only vegan and sustainable club in the world

He is not known for lifting titles. Not even for big football endeavors. He Forest Green Rovers secured promotion to League One (English third league) last season, for the first time since it was founded in 1889. However, its specialty is that it is one of the most interesting clubs in the world.

In a town called Nailsworth, in Glocestershire, he lives the first 100% vegan and ecological club in the world. Barely 7,000 inhabitants live in this town in the south-west of England, where the village of Forest Green gives its name to the most sustainable team on the planet.

His revolutionary change began ten years ago with the arrival of Dale Vince as president. A billionaire and nature lover, he is the owner of Ecotricity, a successful power company, which stands out for its goal of producing and distributing a higher percentage of green electricity every day. Aged 58, Vince left school at the age of 15 to travel through life in a wind van.

Years later, in 2010, when Forest Green went down to the regional league and a real financial collapse, Vince, who was already a millionaire at the time, acquired a club with which he would make a real revolution. A radical change that started very little by little. The first thing he changed was the players’ eating habits. Something that not only involved football players, but also stadium cafeterias. Salads, quinoa hamburgers or drinks with vegetable milk such as soy or hazelnut are among the menus offered in his facilities.

The first wooden stadium

In parallel, five years after his arrival, Vince opened this season Ecopark, the first wooden stadium in the world. No pesticides or chemicals are used for the grass of the field, and the mowing is done by a GPS-guided robot powered by solar energy. In addition, it collects rainwater in cisterns, which it later reuses for irrigation, and supplies the entire stadium with solar energy.

Vince’s sustainable reform also affected the players’ clothing. During the first years of his presidency, he designed utensils made from coffee waste and recycled plastic. Already in 2017, when the entity was recognized by the United Nations as climate neutral, the shirts were made of bamboo.

The entire revolution carried out in thirteen years attracted the attention of many fans, as well as football players. In his idea to expand his project to more clubs, Dale Vince, together with former soccer player Gary Neville, founded the association for the sustainable development of soccer. But he was not the only one. Hector Bellerin fell in love with his idea during a friendly match Arsenal played against Forest Green. So much so that, after meeting with the president, he became the second largest shareholder of the club. The football player has already shown his commitment to nature conservation and climate change. Forest Green does not have a crowded shop window, but it can boast to the whole world that it has given its grain of sand to the preservation of the planet, an action recognized by FIFA as the most ecological club in the world.

Heura, a healthy business that unites football players

With sporting careers ranging from 10 to 15 years, elite footballers manage to accumulate significant assets in a short period of time. Most invest their savings to try to get a return on their income outside of active field life.

It is the real estate business that takes the cake among the players. However, others also choose to invest their money in projects that fit their lifestyle. This is the case of Heura, a 100% plant-based meat company. 2021 Galician Borja Iglesias, Cesc Fábregas, Saúl Ñíguez, Sergi Roberto and Roma player Chris Smalling joined the company which produces products based on vegetable proteins and olive oil, allies of a healthy lifestyle.

Football players point to the international storm of this type of diet and all alternatives to meat consumption, a phenomenon that is no longer related only to vegan consumers, but to an increasingly wide segment of citizens who prefer to reduce meat consumption in their homes. diet for health reasons or to reduce the impact of the global meat industry on the environment. It was the case of the excellent Denis Suárez. It started with veganism because of the “guilt” of his former Arsenal teammate Héctor Bellerín. “I saw how animals are treated before they die and that’s why I decided to be a vegan,” he admitted to La Voz as soon as he returned to Celta. His change in diet also made him invest his money by becoming part of the company Tabalú. The company, which has first league football players and several clubs in its client portfolio, including Vigo, is solely responsible for their nutrition.

A healthier and more sustainable life

In this investment idea, there are many football players who not only adopt veganism as a diet method, but also become active members to expand their belief in the form of business.

One of those cases is Atlético de Madrid soccer player Marcos Llorente. The player has been basing his diet on the paleo diet for years. This is based on foods that could have been eaten during the Paleolithic and includes fruits, vegetables, lean meats, fish, eggs, nuts and seeds. These are foods that in the past people could find by hunting and gathering. Under this idea, together with former athlete Ibai Gómez, he founded a restaurant in Madrid called Naked and Sated. Exporter Miguel Ángel Moya chose the same path with his restaurant Carpo, based on healthy habits.