How much edible food does your business waste every week? And could that excess or date sensitive stock help feed families across London?

We’re just partnered with The Felix Project, to raise awareness of their redistribution service and to help businesses reduce food waste.

The Felix Project is a London based charity, distributing surplus food to those in need. Their vision is ‘good food is never wasted, and no-one goes hungry’ and they collect surplus food that would otherwise go to waste. Instead, it’s delivered to hundreds of food banks, charities and schools across London. In 2024 they redistributed the equivalent of 38 million meals, saving nearly 18,000 tonnes of embedded CO2 in the food rescued. 

Why food waste is such a problem.

Wasted food is a huge problem in the UK, both in households and across retail and hospitality businesses. While some of it is genuine waste (vegetable and fruit peelings, animal bones, tea bags) some is edible food. The latest figures estimate that £21.8billion worth of edible food is wasted in the UK. Whilst the largest percentage is in households, that still leaves a huge amount of waste being generated by businesses.

The impact of this waste is both financial and environmental:  

  • Business financial loss from wasted stock
  • Business financial cost of food waste collection
  • Environmental cost of resources wasted to produce that food – energy that’s gone into growing, manufacturing, transporting and storing food is wasted
  • Environmental cost of food waste. Whilst new legislation means food waste has to be separated and shouldn’t go into landfill (which would generate methane gas), the management of that food waste has a carbon cost

The hospitality and retail food sectors have the challenge of balancing supply and demand and it’s not unusual for excess stock to end up as food waste in a First Mile collection. What we’re aiming to do in our partnership with Felix is to help them intercept that waste and make sure anything edible is contributed to the amazing work they do across the capital.

Here’s how you can donate surplus food to The Felix Project 

What is waste and what can be donated?

A large percentage of the food they collect is fruit and vegetables which they donate to schools, foodbanks and other organisations or cook into nutritious meals at their site in West London.

Here’s a quick summary:

  • Fresh produce – veg, fruit, bread, salad, etc.
  • Ambient produce – tins, packets, boxes, eggs etc.
  • Chilled products – raw meat/fish, dairy products, ready meals, drinks, etc.
  • Frozen foods
  • Food to go – sandwiches, salads, soups, etc.

The Felix Project work with organisations that have a regular supply of excess food but they also welcome one-off donations via the Felix Connect scheme.

How to reduce your food waste

The first step for a business looking to reduce their waste is prevention. Partnering with organisations such as The Felix Project can help with this.  By redistributing your surplus edible food to those who need it, waste is reduced.

Here’s a reminder of how food fits into the hierarchy of waste:

 (Source: WRAP-Food-Surplus-and-Waste-in-the-UK-Key-Facts November-2023)

Although our business is collecting waste, our aim is to help businesses reduce that waste by recycling more, or by redirecting food waste before it gets to the recycle and recover stage. Helping organisations to be more sustainable is at the core of what we do, so if that means less waste for us to collect, we’re there for it.

Food waste that can’t be donated

Inevitably some food will become waste (non-edible parts, or food that is past safe consumption dates). Then it’s about having a safe, reliable food recycling process in place with a company like First Mile.

With Simpler Recycling rules, all food waste should be separated so that it doesn’t end up in landfill. None of the food waste we collect is incinerated [fact check]. It’s either re-purposed to make other things (coffee grounds to make compost, eco-fuel or skincare for example) or it is sent to an anaerobic digester, where it decomposes and produces methane gas, which is captured and used to generate electricity. This treatment means the environmental impact of the food waste is reduced: no harmful gases released into the environment and instead green energy created.

We want to help reduce the carbon footprint of every business we work with, and reducing food waste is one way to do this. If excess food can be donated to feed those in need, it prevents waste and helps support net zero targets. And that means we all win.