Too Good To Go - Saving the planet by reducing food waste.
Launched in 2016, Too Good To Go is an international app tackling food surplus whilst launching a movement against food waste. Every year, one-third of food is thrown away. Food waste reduction is recognised as one of the key ways that we can reverse global warming, and Too Good To Go want to inspire and empower everyone to make those changes. Their app makes surplus food and drink from local stores and restaurants available to consumers at a discounted rate, which recuperates costs for businesses and lowers their footprint.
We speak to co-founder Jamie Crummie about Too Good to Go’s ‘Magic Bags’, the four pillars that they’re hoping will influence attitudes and behaviour towards food reduction, the link between food waste and climate change, and Jamie’s top three food waste-reduction tips.
1. So why don’t we start off at the beginning of your journey. Who founded ‘Too Good To Go’, and what inspired them to come up with the concept?
Before founding Too Good To Go, I worked in Human Rights Law and spent some time with Amnesty International. This was when I really became aware of the issue of food waste, when in 2013, I attended an event that was purely catered for with food that would’ve otherwise been thrown away. I realised that there must be a simpler and more accessible way to fight food waste than dumpster diving and so I started to explore the impact that technology could have in this space. While coming up with a solution, I connected with like-minded entrepreneurs in Copenhagen who were considering a similar idea and we decided to work together to create Too Good To Go. The rest is history!
2. Tell us how the business got off the ground and evolved?
While the idea began as a solution to tackling food waste in the hospitality industry, it’s now developed into so much more than this. Too Good To Go now exists as a platform to significantly reduce food waste from along the food supply chain, from producers and wholesalers to supermarkets and convenience stores to hotels and independent market stalls and everything in between. Since Too Good To Go launched in 2016, we have grown considerably and are now present in 17 countries across Europe and North America. To date, we’ve saved 137 million Magic Bags of food from being wasted!
“We like to think of our concept as a win-win. Businesses are able to recover the otherwise sunk costs of wasted food plus meet new customers and reduce their environmental impact, while consumers can buy and eat great food, all in the knowledge that they’ve prevented it from going to waste and harmful emissions being produced.”
3. How does your business model work? Tell us a bit about your four pillars and their concept.
Too Good To Go is first and foremost an app that connects businesses who have unsold food to consumers who can buy this food for a reduced price. Through the app, Too Good To Go lets people buy surplus food and drink from any food business, from hotels, restaurants, grocery stores, pubs to producers. Consumers simply download the free Too Good To Go app and search for nearby businesses with unsold produce. They then purchase a ‘Magic Bag’ which is filled with food worth three times what they pay, collect it at an allotted time and enjoy it.
The success of our app powers our mission to drive a food waste movement. We work across four pillars: schools, industries, households and governments to help influence attitudes and behaviour to reduce food waste and build a planet-friendly food system.
For example, we recently launched our ‘Look, Smell, Taste, Don’t Waste’ date label campaign, where we’re working with some of the UK’s most well-known food brands, such as Danone and The Laughing Cow, to help clarify the meaning of Best Before labels and encourage the public to use their senses when it comes to knowing if food is okay to eat. Half of all food waste is created in our homes, so if we can help inspire change in our attitude to food and habits beyond using our app alone, then we can have an even greater impact on the amount of food eaten and enjoyed instead of wasted.
“Half of all food waste is created in our homes, so if we can help inspire change in our attitude to food and habits beyond using our app alone, then we can have an even greater impact on the amount of food eaten and enjoyed instead of wasted.”
4. How many partnerships do you have globally speaking?
Globally, we’ve partnered with over 153,000 food businesses to help redistribute their unsold food and prevent it from going to waste. We work with any business that has food, whether it be national supermarkets like SPAR, Morrisons or Co-Op; coffee shops like Starbucks and Pret a Manger, hospitality groups like Toby Carvery or Greene King, through to on-the-go places like Greggs and Subway alongside thousands of local, independent businesses.
5. What have been the biggest challenges?
One of the biggest challenges is awareness. As previously mentioned, our research last year found that over two thirds of Brits do not recognise the links between food waste and climate change. For us to tackle the issue of food waste quicker, this needs to change. The more people understand the issue, and how simple it is to solve, the quicker we’ll see changes in behaviour across the board.
“Over two thirds of Brits do not recognise the links between food waste and climate change”
6. You are a global company, do you sometimes experience complications coordinating the business?
The great thing about our app is that it is a simple model that works and this makes it easy to replicate across markets quickly. However, we have dedicated teams in each market we operate in to ensure we’re working efficiently and effectively. Naturally there are always sector differences from country to country which is why it’s so important we have that local knowledge on the ground. Different policies and behaviours really do drive decision-making when it comes to solving food waste. For example, in France legislation has been passed that bans supermarkets from throwing away or destroying unsold food.
7. What is the achievement in the company's history you are most proud of?
For us, the biggest measure of how we’re helping the planet is how many Magic Bags of surplus food we are diverting from going to waste. It’s how we can track the direct impact of our app in tackling food waste in real time. To date, we’ve saved an amazing 11 million Magic Bags of food from going to waste in the UK and in doing so, have saved 12.5 million kg of harmful greenhouse gases (C02e) from being wasted. This saving is the equivalent yearly C02e emissions of almost 1,500 UK citizens.
It was also a pivotal moment for the business when Too Good To Go became a certified B Corporation in 2020. This means we’re part of a global community of over 2,600 certified businesses, including Innocent, Patagonia and Alpro, who are using business as a force for good and leading the way in sustainable practices.
I would say that the thing I’m most proud of however, is the community of Waste Warriors that we have built. Not only do we now have hundreds of people working at Too Good To Go who are fighting food waste with huge passion and commitment, but we are also inspiring millions of people across the world to fight food waste with us. We’re in a position right now that I could only ever have dreamed of when we started back in 2016 and the future is looking really exciting.
“To date, we’ve saved an amazing 11 million Magic Bags of food from going to waste in the UK and in doing so, have saved 12.5 million kg of harmful greenhouse gases (C02e) from being wasted.”
8. Do you have any tips for our readers, concerning their perception of food and the way one could better deal with reducing waste.
My top three tips would be:
Only buy what you need. An easy way to achieve this is to plan carefully about the meals that you’re shopping for. For instance, planning meals that utilise the same, or parts of the same, ingredient means that you’re not buying a new set of ingredients for every meal.
Get creative with your leftovers and embrace the chance to explore new ways of working with ingredients. Why not have a go at making a broccoli pesto using the broccoli stalks that you’d usually throw away, or keeping the peel on your potatoes when you’re mashing them? Little changes like these really can make all the difference.
Trust your senses when it comes to Best Before labels. Just because a product is past its Best Before date doesn’t mean it’s inedible. Before throwing it out, make sure you use your senses to work out if it’s actually gone off! You’d be surprised how many food items actually last way beyond their Best Before date.
9. You’ve talked about the UN sustainable development goal 12, do you believe this goal can be reached and what do you think is the most important factor to reach it?
It is everyone’s responsibility to do something to reverse the impact of climate change, but it’s important that large corporations and governments lead from the front and inspire and empower others to take action too.
“The reality is that no one solution is big enough to solve the problem of food waste, collective action and collaboration is what it is going to take.”
10. What are your future goals for ‘Too Good To Go’?
Right now, our priority is simply in saving more food from going to waste. The UK’s food waste problem is huge - we’re wasting 10 million tonnes of food each year! So there’s still a lot of room for growth. Ultimately we want to make sure that all edible food is being eaten and so we want to be partnering with all businesses - no matter how big or small - and attracting as many new consumers as we can. On top of this is the education piece. Our goal is to help everyone recognise how much an impact food waste has on the planet so that we start to see fundamental behaviour shifts towards food both inside and outside of the home.
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