The Too Good to Go app marks a new step in the virtuous wasteless path, which transforms food waste into shared profit. With the Dispensa Boxes, it recovers products that are about to be discarded from the food industries and delivers them to your home, at half the price. (1)
Anti-waste pantry box
The project, launched in May 2023, is based on the agreement with around fifty food industries in Italy to sell at half price on the Too Good To Go platform products destined for waste because they have labeling or packaging defects, canceled or surplus orders and close to reaching the ‘best before date’, the minimum shelf life after which the food may partially lose its organoleptic properties but is still edible. (2)
All foods can be stored at room temperature, so no food safety problems arise. Today, for example, the app offers Dispensa Boxes with Venchi chocolate, Bonomelli infusions, various products from Plasmon, Alpro, Cameo. All at half price.
An appreciated service
In six months of activity, the initiative seems capable of reducing food waste, selling food at reduced prices and solving the management of surpluses in the food production phase. With the sale of over 100 thousand boxes, food worth 5 million euros was consumed at advantageous prices.
In short, the success was replicated of the Magic Boxes, which at an affordable fixed price (around 5 euros) allow you to purchase unsold food in retail stores (bakeries, supermarkets, pizzerias, etc.). (3)
What consumer information
The animators of the app founded in 2016 in Denmark and now spread across 17 countries (between Europe and the USA), they also shine for the quality of the information provided to the consumer, complete with list of ingredients, with evidence of allergens, and nutritional table for each Pantry Box.
A behavior normal, but not obvious, as demonstrated by the repeated violations detected on various e-commerce platforms. (4)
#Wasteless (5)
Marta Strinati
Footnotes
(1) See https://www.toogoodtogo.com/it
(2) Dario Dongo. Expiry date and TMC, EFSA guidelines for the reduction of food waste. GIFT (Great Italian Food Trade). 20.12.20
(3) Marta Strinati. Food on sale at the end of the shift with Too Good To Go, the app against waste. GIFT (Great Italian Food Trade). 27.2.20
(4) Marta Strinati. The omissions of online shopping platforms. Altroconsumo survey. GIFT (Great Italian Food Trade). 22.10.23
(5) Wasteless – Waste Quantification Solution to Limit Environmental Stress – is a European project that aims to develop tools for quantifying and monitoring food waste and losses. See the previous article Dario Dongo, Andrea Adelmo Della Penna. Wasteless, EU research project on circular economy and blockchain. GIFT (Great Italian Food Trade).
Professional journalist since January 1995, he has worked for newspapers (Il Messaggero, Paese Sera, La Stampa) and periodicals (NumeroUno, Il Salvagente). She is the author of journalistic surveys on food, she has published the book "Reading labels to know what we eat".
