Unbelievable Waste at the Supermarket

[the_lizardqueen]

I am currently having major issues with the sheer amount of waste at my workplace. I work as a clerk in the bakery department of a grocery store. I'm refraining from naming the exact chain because I am fully intending to rant and besides, I am under the impression that the policy is unfortunately not just restricted to my store and company. I can only hope that there are exceptions.

As a bakery clerk, it is my responsibility to clean out the bakery during evening shifts. This involves disposing of all of the bulk rolls, bread and donuts, as well as any of the products out on the floor that may have expired. That seems to make sense, doesn't it? However, on the average night I throw out:

2 to 3 Shopping carts full of prepackaged bread, buns, cookies, cakes, pastries, etc.

1 Cartload of sourdough loaves, french bread, baguettes, special breads, etc.

3 to 4 Garbage bins full of buns, donuts and showcase items.

This consistently happens every night, which means we are disposing of over 2000 cartloads of food a year at my store alone.

And we are talking mounding cartloads and garbage bags that are stuffed to the top, and all of it goes in the dumpster, which is locked and crushes the food upon closing the door. The worst thing is that most of the buns and breads are only one day old. If my managers were to eliminate the ridiculous policy of throwing out any of the buns and breads that are a day old, it would at least half the amount of waste.

There are so many things that could be done to fix the issue. They could be following the example of stores in other locations and donating the food to charity. They could cut back on the amount that they are producing, as at the moment the bakers at my store are turning out way too much product. It would seem that they believe customers will only buy product if the shelves look full, so perhaps we could run a tighter, more efficient sales area. They could mark older products down. Anything would be good! Heck, they could get an open, non-compacting dumpster so that the Freegans could get in!

There's people starving in our own cities and across the world. It's not just food that's being wasted, it's the money that goes into the transportation costs and the ingredients, time and energy used to produce the food. And don't even get me started on the sheer amount of papers and non-biodegradeable plastics that are going into the packaging that eventually ends up in the dumpster.

It just sickens me that massive corporations are now able to treat food as a non essential luxury. They are more concerned with profit as well as keeping their products and stores looking good.

I'm not sure how much longer I will last at the job, especially with my habit of telling the customers straight up that I'm throwing out the food whenever they ask (one of my coworkers often claims it's going to charity just to avoid conflicts). I just feel so helpless knowing that when I quit someone else will step in and continue tossing food. I wish I could change the way that things are being done.

Anyways, I just wanted to get this off of my chest, I thank anyone that's actually read through the entire rant and I am hoping that perhaps spreading the knowledge might help somehow.

[Nate]

That reminds me of the Navy. Part of the Navy policy is that no seconds whatsoever were to be issued to anyone. I remember going through the line once like a minute before they shut down and I was like, "Hey, lemme get two chicken patties."

He replied, "You can't have two."

"You're just going to throw those away in one minute, right?"

"Yeah."

"So you'd rather throw the food away then give it to someone who would eat it?"

"I can't help it, it's ship's policy."

That was annoying. And yeah, a lot of places throw away food that's over a day old because it isn't fresh. I understand this whole freshness thing is the gimmick of some stores, but it really makes little sense, it's a waste of money...that's what gets me. Businesses are all about making money, and if you're throwing your investments (literally) into the trash, that's just a waste of money.

Actually, a couple of stores around here have a "day old" aisle with stuff that isn't fresh, but hasn't gone bad yet. It's usually a bit cheaper too. This seems like a more cost-effective solution, the food really only needs to be thrown out when it has expired, not just because it isn't "fresh" anymore. It saves on the amount of money wasted, because let's face it...those goods weren't obtained for free, so to spend money creating items and then just throwing them out, is a waste of time, and a waste of money, which I was under the impression businesses liked.

[ashfire]

I can agree with you there. If the food can not be given to those in need why don't they come up with ways to use outdated foods instead of sending them to the dump to rot and take up space.
I keep thinking that waste items could be the next thing added to vehicle fuels to push more foreign oil out of here.
We got to stop the waste of anything that could be of use to help the people.

[Mr. SmartyPants]

I work at Wendy's, and I know that the food has atleast a 3 day hold period after cooked. Or something like that.

[White Raven]

Sadly this happens all the time.

I feel the same way about throwing food/money/clothes away.

So many people need food. But yet our society is so wasteful.

I know what it’s like to be one of those kids, depending on the Salivation Army, for a winter coat. And then seeing other kids, that have three coats, they don’t even wear, because they are out of fashion.

My life has changed so much from when I was a kid. Sure me and Jeremy budget and sometimes things are a little tight.
But we never have to go hungry.

And I’m thankful for that.

[GhostontheNet]

I am currently having major issues with the sheer amount of waste at my workplace. I work as a clerk in the bakery department of a grocery store. I'm refraining from naming the exact chain because I am fully intending to rant and besides, I am under the impression that the policy is unfortunately not just restricted to my store and company. I can only hope that there are exceptions.

As a bakery clerk, it is my responsibility to clean out the bakery during evening shifts. This involves disposing of all of the bulk rolls, bread and donuts, as well as any of the products out on the floor that may have expired. That seems to make sense, doesn't it? However, on the average night I throw out:

2 to 3 Shopping carts full of prepackaged bread, buns, cookies, cakes, pastries, etc.

1 Cartload of sourdough loaves, french bread, baguettes, special breads, etc.

3 to 4 Garbage bins full of buns, donuts and showcase items.

This consistently happens every night, which means we are disposing of over 2000 cartloads of food a year at my store alone.

And we are talking mounding cartloads and garbage bags that are stuffed to the top, and all of it goes in the dumpster, which is locked and crushes the food upon closing the door. The worst thing is that most of the buns and breads are only one day old. If my managers were to eliminate the ridiculous policy of throwing out any of the buns and breads that are a day old, it would at least half the amount of waste.

There are so many things that could be done to fix the issue. They could be following the example of stores in other locations and donating the food to charity. They could cut back on the amount that they are producing, as at the moment the bakers at my store are turning out way too much product. It would seem that they believe customers will only buy product if the shelves look full, so perhaps we could run a tighter, more efficient sales area. They could mark older products down. Anything would be good! Heck, they could get an open, non-compacting dumpster so that the Freegans could get in!

There's people starving in our own cities and across the world. It's not just food that's being wasted, it's the money that goes into the transportation costs and the ingredients, time and energy used to produce the food. And don't even get me started on the sheer amount of papers and non-biodegradeable plastics that are going into the packaging that eventually ends up in the dumpster.

It just sickens me that massive corporations are now able to treat food as a non essential luxury. They are more concerned with profit as well as keeping their products and stores looking good.

I'm not sure how much longer I will last at the job, especially with my habit of telling the customers straight up that I'm throwing out the food whenever they ask (one of my coworkers often claims it's going to charity just to avoid conflicts). I just feel so helpless knowing that when I quit someone else will step in and continue tossing food. I wish I could change the way that things are being done.

Anyways, I just wanted to get this off of my chest, I thank anyone that's actually read through the entire rant and I am hoping that perhaps spreading the knowledge might help somehow.

Its another one of those downsides of the industrial free markets in my opinion - they have the tendency to vastly overproduce goods far above what their target markets would actually would ever end up using, usually resulting in some pretty bad effects somewhere in the world. I wish I had any consolation for what lies down this little rabbit hole, or perhaps more accurately snake hole of thought you've started on, but I really don't - it just gets worse and worse he more pieces of the puzzle you learn. Its really depressing when you think about it - so much of this grain is produced annually that goes torwards psychological tricks that lead people to want to go where food and things are most abundant, which is one of the reasons megacorp strores like your Walmarts and your national groccers end up wiping out local groccers and merchants. Also, throwing out bread products after a mere one day allows you the Reputation Brownie Points of always being able to say that your bread is fresh without lying (as bakeries that do hold bread products longer than a day will lie and say its fresh, rather than lie and say its going to charity). Meanwhile, a lot of this psychological grain isn't feeding starving people around the world because its sitting in a dumpster. Add to this the cash crops like cofee and fruit grown in the third world countries where people are starving and where the same fields could more profitably and more sustainably (hence massive slash and burn farming) grow grains to feed the people of their own country. These sorts of sets of cause and effect applies to almost every industry I can think of, when you look deep enough.

If the_lizardqueen and readers of this thread want to get involved, perhaps at risk to their employment for the sake of helping to better the world, they should see about supporting movements like America's Second Harvest at http://www.secondharvest.org/ with what resources and potential they have. If not, they should at least pray the old kyrie eleison in intercession before God for some of the bitter fruits of the darker sides of our nation's way of life. Here I'm not so much interested in any political debates or that sort of thing as I'm trying to contribute more information about what I know about this topic to help feed more people.

[Arnobius]

In my area the local Safeways had a habit of donating items that they could do so without fear of lawsuit (in case it went bad) to local soup kitchens so they did not go to waste. Day old bread was one of those items they were able to do this with.

[SP1]

We have a store near us that ONLY stocks bakery overruns and items near or on the expiration date. They do a brisk business. There is a large homeless/needy food pantry that gets a lot of stuff from various grocery stores, too.

If you feel guilty about this waste, get in touch with a local community service org and see if they can put the store in touch with someone who will cart it off each day.

Reality check: In the US, the government has to subsidize production of grain crops because farmers produce so much that the price would otherwise be super low and they would take a loss growing them. Yes, there are a lot of hungry people out there. However, in this country, it's not the availability of food that creates this condition. I work a food line with our local church. Of the people that come in for this free meal, the vast majority are overweight. Hmm. Personally, I think it is more of an efficient distribution problem rather that food availability itself. That's where you come in: If you can make it easier for the store to get rid of older goods (to a user group) rather than throwing it out, cool.

[Needle Noggin]

I'm pretty sure they make this old food into pigs food.

[Authority3000]

I'm pretty sure they make this old food into pigs food.

Indeed they do. With the majority of products that are applicable that is, which generally donates to almost anything made from grain. e.g. commercial donuts.

It's not really a immediately solvable problem in my opinion though, the downright atrocious quality of most food being thrown away(err, I mean brought to pig farms) from most stores that do so, makes it hardly tolerable to give away to even the most very poor. No reason to funnel to those that can't afford better - a product of such low quality that even small corporations are able to boatload out several tons of it every day for no profit at all without giving it a second thought.

The nutritional value of most of these products could easily be measured using negative values. IE, they cause more harm then good.

My subjective take on the matter is therefore that using the wasted products for any other means then they are currently being used for, would not really be less of a wast, channeling it through to the hungry homeless populace instead of to the pig farms (a rather revolting concept when thought of) would only cause more overweight homeless people (odd thought), and possibly cause harm because of this.

I do think it's a terrible waste, though the giving away of these low quality products -- vs what their doing right now with them -- really wouldn't help anything in my opinion.

[HisaishiFan]

That's pretty terrible. A lot of stores around here donate to God's Pantry anything that is dated and just about to go out of date. A local bakery donates all their day-out bread, scones, etc. to Meals on Wheels (I volunteer on Mondays). My church also takes the leftover bread for a . . . well, we just call it the bread ministry. We take bread to people who could use it. Maybe you should talk to the bakery manager and store manager to see if they'd be willing to donate it. Maybe it isn't a chain-wide policy. I appreciate what you said about the non-compacting dumpster, too. I never knew the term "freegan," but for many years I scaled dumpsters for furniture, books, school supplies, etc. A local grocery store would just set out slightly old produce by the dumpster in crates for a day and I'd always pick some up.

[ssj2gohan61]

i work in a pub that we have to get rid of most food before the expiration date adn there is also a 3 day hold on cooked food already..though i dont mind the free milkshakes when milk is within the expiration dates lol

[termyt]

I recommend doing a little leg work and then making a recommendation to store management.

First go out and find a local charity who takes in food donations. Find out what the charity's requirements are for donation - i.e. freshness, quantity, whether they'll come and get it or if it has to be delivered, etc, etc. Also try to figure out how much the store can right off as a tax exemption for a charitable gift. (Hopefully it will be greater than - or at least equal to - the tax deduction for simply throwing the food away.)

With all the data you can get from a few charities, present a plan to you management on how to donate the excess food. Even if you just take a car load to the charity every day, you'll be doing a good thing.

Having real data and a solid plan is a much better place to start a discussion with your boss. You’ll be much more persuasive if you start with “I don’t like that we throw away so much food – here’s what we can do with itâ€

[Uriah]

I have a very simple, unchristilike soloution, find the person who set the policy, and kneecap them. I have not tried this as of yet, however, so I can't promise it works..