First, let’s start off by sharing some humbling numbers, indicating that 40 percent of all food produced in the US each year is thrown away. Each person in the world also throws out approximately 74kg food waste per year, resulting in a total of 1.3 billion tonnes. This equals a third of all the food produced around the globe.
But it is not all doom and gloom. While 43 billion pounds of food were wasted in the US in 2008, that number was reduced to 21 billion in 2019. Stats from Re-Fed also show that the total amount of food wasted has decreased by 2 percent in the last three years.
Consumers care
The issue is high on the agenda of many NGOs and included in the UN Sustainable Development goals, aiming to reduce food waste by 50 percent up to year 2030. Data from IFIC also shows that consumers care about the issue. While grocery shopping 34 percent of consumers state that they always have food waste in mind, and 41 percent sometimes have it in mind.
That is why reducing food waste has become such an important issue for many grocery retailers. Not only does it save cost in an increasingly competitive market, but, more importantly, it ensures that brands and consumers align when it comes to sustainability and food waste.
Dates and instant flashes
Pricer enables several of the world’s foremost retail grocery chains to be industry leaders in reducing food waste. By implementing innovative solutions that make date checking more efficient and solutions that enable selling expiring products at optimal price before they go to waste, these retailers are now best-in-class.
No more do store associates have to go around the store and check every product for short dates. Instead, digital solutions guide employees to specific products and with supporting innovations like Instant Flash time spent in the store aisles are significantly shortened.
By combining smart expiration date management and analytics system with Pricers real-time ESL capabilities, food waste is minimized, pricing is dynamically optimized, and staff efficiency maximized. Learn more about the solutions used by the world leading retailers to reduce food waste here: Waste Management Solution for Grocery Retailers.
Published on August 26th, 2021.
