On a cool but sunny February day in west Toronto, a temperature-controlled truck pulls up to the back of a Metro grocery store, where pallets of groceries about to reach their expiration date wait. It’s time for the Daily Bread Food Bank’s weekly pickup.
Every package of meat, loaf of bread and deli item was carefully inspected before arriving at the loading dock.
For grocers, selling perishables means making ongoing choices for each item on display, especially those nearing the end of their shelf life. For those that don’t sell out in time, most stores try to donate them to food banks rather than throwing them away.
“These are daily calls,” said John Crisafulli, Metro store manager, during a visit with a reporter from The Canadian Press. All departments start their day by looking for items that are near their expiration date and discarding them, as well as those that have imperfections or defects that make them unwanted.
Metro’s guidelines are simple. Two days before their expiration date, packaged products are subject to a 30% discount. If they still aren’t sold the day before, an employee takes them off the shelves and freezes them in the back room warehouse to donate to local food banks.
Some of these products are also sold on food rescue apps such as Too Good To Gosaid Dave Dinning, Metro’s senior director of operations in Ontario.
On the other hand, the shelf life of fresh products is more difficult to determine and is left to the discretion of employees.
Take the example of apples. Mr. Crisafulli examines the honeycrisps, galas and Granny Smiths, rearranges the display and selects those with defects, bruises or holes. He then places the less attractive apples in a bag, marks it at $2, and puts it back on the shelf in the discount section. Later, fresher apples complete the selection. Finally, unsold goods become fodder for animals.
At Metro, this process repeats itself several times a day.
Three ways to deal with unsold items
According to John Lowrey, an assistant professor at Northeastern University’s D’Amore-McKim School of Business who studies food waste and retailer donations, there are three ways to deal with unsold items: Put them on sale at a discount , throw them away or give them away. Deciding the fate of a fresh produce can be a lot of work, he adds.
PHOTO COLE BURSTON, THE CANADIAN PRESS
There are three ways to deal with unsold items: put them on sale at a discount, throw them away or donate them.
“The employee must first inspect the product and then move it to another part of the store,” Mr. Lowrey said in an interview. And if it doesn’t sell, it’s inspected again before being thrown away.
Donations can be more effective.
Food retailers often donate food to avoid waste management costs and landfill fees, Lowrey said. They can also benefit from tax incentives.
Indeed, when you have leftover food, you can either pay a per kilo collection fee to the waste management companies, or remove it for free and donate it to the food bank.
John Lowrey, assistant professor at Northeastern University’s D’Amore-McKim School of Business
Last year, Metro said it donated 4 million kilograms of food through its One More Bite program. Other Canadian grocers, including Loblaw, Sobeys and Walmart, also donate a portion of their surplus food.
Loblaw said its franchises, stores and distribution centers donated 6.7 million kilograms of food to local organizations in 2022.
Sobeys and Walmart have their own programs, but did not respond to requests for details.
Food banks have a long-standing partnership with food retailers, whether large chains or local stores, said Kirstin Beardsley, executive director of Food Banks Canada.
“We rely on support from grocery stores,” she said, because donations from food drives declined during the pandemic and have not recovered. According to Mme Beardsley, food banks receive about 50% of donations from the food industry, including retailers, manufacturers and farmers.
Donations are not uniform. The Edmonton Food Bank, for example, receives a large quantity of salvaged food from its partners Loblaw, Sobeys and Walmart – including strawberries, spinach and other fresh produce.
Toronto’s Daily Bread Food Bank, meanwhile, is not accepting fresh produce from its partners, Metro and Food Basics, due to the challenges of a tight rotation window – and the need to ensure that food food remains safe for consumption.
” A double-edged weapon ”
According to Heather McLeod-Kilmurray, a law professor at the University of Ottawa specializing in food law, foods whose expiration date has passed can still be safely consumed, even if they have lost their freshness.
“Grocery stores think consumers won’t want to buy these foods and won’t want to see them on the shelves,” she said. This makes the food seem unsafe or undesirable to buy. But actually, that’s not true. »
Food bank staff typically sort donations, adding an extra layer of food safety measures before redistributing them.
PHOTO COLE BURSTON, THE CANADIAN PRESS
A customer walks down an aisle at a Metro grocery store in Toronto.
But it’s possible that food donations are linked to higher prices in stores, Mr. Lowrey suggested.
“In a sense, food donations can be a double-edged sword,” he said.
Mr. Lowrey’s study showed that when grocers intervene early in the shelf life of products, replacing them with fresh produce, overall quality is better for consumers.
This has the effect of increasing the quality of products on the shelf and the average prices, which keeps prices high.
John Lowrey, assistant professor at Northeastern University’s D’Amore-McKim School of Business
Still, Lowrey believes grocers’ donation initiatives promote sustainability and help communities meet their emergency needs.
For Daily Bread, the partnership with Metro brands is a lifeline.
With every pallet loaded into the back of the truck each day, one fewer family goes to bed hungry – and one fewer pallet ends up in a landfill.