“We’re able to afford meat,” Tamasiunas said. “I’m picking up some meat today, and I’ll just freeze it. I mean, it’s half-off.”
Related:
It’s a win-win: Tamasiunas gets deals on beef roast and pork loins. Meijer makes last-minute sales of items that would otherwise soon be headed for the trash.
The program, a partnership between the Michigan grocery chain and a Canadian app company called Flashfood, represents a growing push by retailers, consumers and regulators to cut back on food waste that makes up 24 percent of America’s municipal landfill use.
In 2021, retailers sent 1.6 million tons of surplus food to landfills, according to ReFED, a national nonprofit focused on reducing food waste. Beyond being a shame in a nation where an estimated 34 million people (including 9 million children) are food insecure, that’s a problem for grocery stores. They take a loss on inventory that doesn’t sell.
“It makes so much sense” to address the problem, said Flashfood Director of Communications Esther Cohn.
In partnering with Flashfood, Meijer cuts back on its share of America’s grocery waste while making affordable food more accessible, said Jess Murray, the Michigan-based grocery chain’s vice president of store operations.
“Food has always been at the heart of what we do as a retailer,” Murray said, “and we want to be sure that we’re taking care of our neighbors first and foremost, as well as responsibly keeping food out of the landfills.”
It’s an issue that vexes food retailers and state environmental regulators, who are looking to improve Michigan’s reputation for wastefulness. The state’s recycling and composting rate of 21 percent is markedly lower than the national average of 32 percent.
“The moment (food) goes into the garbage, it is a literal waste in the sense that dollars worth of time and energy are wasted,” said Aaron Hiday, compost coordinator for the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy (EGLE). “It was put there for nothing.”
Meijer didn’t respond to a Bridge Michigan question about how much food it puts in landfills each year. But Murray said Meijer also donates millions of pounds annually to food banks or repurposes food scraps as compost and animal feed.