What happens to the food when restaurants and cafés close with leftovers?

Once this would have been considered a massive food waste issue – however, the social impact company Too Good To Go is changing the way Irish establishments deal with this waste.

On Breakfast Business, Too Good To Go Sales Manager Michaela O’Leary said the company’s goal is simply “to reduce food waste”.

“We have an app, it's free to download, and what it does is it connects you with local businesses who have surplus food available,” she said.

“My team says it really well: It's just food that didn't sell at the right time.

“Think of a bakery that has beautiful croissants - they sell 80% of them during the day and what they have left over at the end of the day, traditionally, they would have had to put in the bin.

“Instead now they can sell it on Too Good To Go and us as a consumer, can buy it at a reduced price.”

Various frozen food in freezer. Image: Alamy

The website now has 70,000 customers in Ireland.

Ms O’Leary said all the information you need to know is on the app.

“You pay through the app and what you will see on the profile of the store is a bit of an indication of the type of food it may be,” she said.

“[You can see] if it's a bakery, a Chinese restaurant, a grocery store, the time you should go into the store and collect it, as well as any instructions [telling you] maybe to go to customer service, go to the till, wherever is the best place to collect.”

Too Good To Go mobile app. Image: Alamy

While the app does give you an indication of the type of food you’re buying, Ms O’Leary said that each bag is different.

“Some people love the surprise, it adds a bit of magic,” she said.

“You know, you collect a bag of food, you're not quite sure what's in it, you open it, and you're really surprised, and you love it.

“Some people don't love the surprises when they're collecting… but our mission is to reduce food waste, so our surprise bags have to have whatever the business has left over at the end of the day.

“Now, some of our partners, SuperValu for example, have a surf and turf surprise bag – so you know you're going to get meat and fish in that surprise bag.”

Takeaway

The company’s promise to their customers is that they are receiving food for a third of the retail price.

Recently, the company celebrated saving 250,000 meals with Aldi – one of their biggest national partners in Ireland.

“To be able to redistribute that amount of food through Aldi has really allowed us to grow and thrive in Ireland,” Ms O’Leary said.

“I think for me what I love about the partnership in Aldi is that it's nationwide, so you don't have to be in Dublin, you don't have to be in Cork, you can be in my hometown in Killarney, you can be in Claremorris and you can still save food.

“Part of our mission is to empower people to save food wherever they are, so that involves having nationwide availability.”

Image: Just Eat

Ms O’Leary said Too Good To Go really focus on customer experience.

“Too Good To Go is really interesting because the experience that the customer has is based on how the partner interacts with them, how our businesses interact with them,” she said.

“So anytime you purchase a surprise bag, you will get a little survey afterwards, and you're able to rate, you know, the quality of the surprise bag, how the experience in store was…

“Because what's really important to us is that our customers feel like full customers - you don't want to go in and kind of be like, ‘Oh, what's Too Good To Go? What's going on? You want a lovely experience.

“So you can see on the app the rating of the business that you're going to - I'm proud to say our average rating in Ireland is four point two out of five.”

Ms O’Leary said the businesses that get involved with Too Good To Go must ensure they are committed to reducing food waste and ensure they have plans in place for offering the surprise bags.

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A cafe worker in a face mask holding a packed lunch ready for delivery. Picture by: Roman Lacheev / Alamy Stock Photo