Superstore program helps sell expiring food

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This article was published 09/11/2019 (2173 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Visitors to Brandon’s Real Canadian Superstore location in Brandon might have noticed a new fridge and shelves pop up at the front of the store in recent months.

In mid-July, Brandon’s Superstore joined parent company Loblaws’ partnership with Flashfood. Flashfood is also available in 10 other stores in Manitoba, in addition to various grocery stores throughout North America.

Customers using the Flashfood smartphone app can purchase a selection of food close to their best before or expiry dates at half-price.

The program offers benefits to both customers and the stores. Customers get to buy items at a steep discount while stores sell more food that they might otherwise throw out.

When grocery items near their expiry date, Superstore moves the products to either a fridge or a set of shelves at the front of the store.

Those items are then listed on the Flashfood app. Customers select what they want, pay through the app and then pick their items up in store.

Items available for purchase on Friday included prime rib steaks, ground beef, bacon, pies and boxes of assorted fruits and vegetables.

According to local Superstore manager Royce Reid, approximately 15,000 pounds of food have been diverted from going to the landfill.

Reid said items sold through Flashfood are usually a day or two before their best-before dates.

“It was a little slow at the start there, but once people started asking questions … it’s picked up pretty good,” Reid said.

The most popular items are meat because of rising meat prices, he added.

On Friday, sale items included a pork tenderloin club pack on sale for $7.45 (down from $14.91), a cinnamon coffee cake on sale for $3.25 (down from $6.50) and bone-in strip loin steak for $28.65 (down from $57.29).

Paige Johal of Winnipeg only recently started using Flashfood, but told the Sun that she has changed her grocery plans based around what’s available on the app.

“The other day there was a lot of bone-in pork sirloin, so I baked a bunch of pork sirloin and put the rest in the freezer,” she said. “Meat and produce is one of the most expensive things on your grocery bill and I’ve cut it in half.”

Johal added that she’s now buying more meat than she would have because of the savings involved.

Of course, once customers buy the products, they need to use them in order for the app to have its intended food-waste reduction effect: According to the National Zero Waste Council, Canadian households throw away more than $1,100 worth of food each year on average, and nearly half of food waste occurs at the consumer level.

It calls for a holistic approach to food-waste management strategy, the first segment of which is prevention of food waste in the first place. This is followed by recovery of safe and nutritious food for people and scraps for animals, and recycling energy and nutrients from the remaining waste.

The strategy also calls for an overhaul of food labelling laws to alleviate confusion over best-before dates, which don’t necessarily mean “don’t use past this date.”

That confusion contributes to the app’s success: literal tonnes of still-edible food sits on shelves, days away from being thrown out even if it could still make for a fine dinner or snack.

Superstore said that the best time to get these deals is from 10 a.m. to noon, when the supply is most full.

» cslark@brandonsun.com, with files from the Winnipeg Free Press

» Twitter: @ColinSlark