Charity Not for Sale claims the chain is yet to pay a £60,000 invoice for carbon offset work carried out in 2024, according to a story in The Times. Gaucho has since stopped working with Not for Sale earlier this year, according to the charity.
Not for Sale further claims that it sent an invoice in April and repeatedly requested payment. According to the email seen by The Times, Gaucho responded saying: “As you may know, we have changed leadership recently and as part of that we are assessing many of the group’s activities and priorities, including the way we offset carbon and the charities we support.
“As a result of this review, we have decided to focus our funds and activities in other areas and therefore we will not be making a donation to Not For Sale this year and instead will pursue a different carbon strategy.
“We will continue to review the right way forward and may well decide to come back to you in the future, but for the moment have decided to press pause on this route.”
Current CEO Baton Berisha took charge of Gaucho in March, following the leadership of Martin Williams, who stepped down in October last year.
Gaucho responds
Gaucho’s parent company Rare Restaurants says that the company was “not aware of any agreement or formal arrangement [with Not For Sale] at any time”.
It also says that Not For Sale had a personal relationship with the former CEO of the business [Williams] and that it “did provide some support for [Not For Sale] in 2024 under the previous CEO”.
The company adds that Not For Sale “are not a UK charity and have not provided any financial information to us or evidence for how they have previously used funds”.
It says: “Going forward Gaucho has decided to transfer their support to other charities and reviews this each year going forward.
“Now and in the future Gaucho will only act with and through UK registered charity organisations
Not For Sale’s website describes its partnership with Rare Restaurants ‘as a testament to how businesses can drive global change beyond customer-facing initiatives’.
It says the relationship was established through Williams, who it says is a long-time supporter of Not For Sale, ‘who has helped embed financial and operational support into the core of Rare Restaurants’ ethos’.
Gaucho operates 20 branches across the UK, including 12 in London, and earned a two-star rating from the Sustainable Restaurant Association last year.
David Batstone, founder and president of Not For Sale, told The Times that the group was “reneging on a commitment that they had already made and had even shouted to the world about this commitment”.