Food Waste Focus Blog

This is a recurring feature where LeanPath Executive Chef Robb White examines real food waste images from LeanPath 360s and shares insights based on what he sees.

Overproduced scrambled eggs. This is such a common thing to see in our food waste photography. Breakfast buffets—or buffets in general—are difficult to match production to demand. Plus you've got the additional concern of having a visually bountiful spread. A recipe for waste. Eggs are often mass produced in the morning in big batches that aren’t justified by sales, but that buffet looks full!

Consider these tips to cut down on the waste:

Based on LeanPath data, colleges and universities generate between 4-10 percent pre-consumer food waste (by value, as a percentage of food purchases). Post-consumer food waste--or plate waste--is often equivalent to the pre-consumer waste, suggesting between 8-15 percent total food waste.

US Food Waste Summit, panel on Measurement of Food Waste. Panelists from left to right: Andrew Shakman, LeanPath, Inc.  |  Nell Fry, Sodexo  |  Kai Robertson, World Resources Institute  |  Alison Grantham, Blue Apron  |  Lisa Johnson, North Carolina State University  |  Jackie Suggitt, ReFED 

LeanPath recently returned from the US Food Waste Summit in Cambridge, MA, a powerful event led by the Harvard Food Law and Policy Clinic and ReFED which brought together leaders from all over the globe to focus on solutions to the food waste challenge.

IKEA Lyssach, in northern Switzerland, serves 6,000 to 8,000 meals in a six-day work week. For the past year, it has been tracking food waste with LeanPath at its restaurant, co-worker restaurant, bistro and Swedish Food Market. The food waste data has driven targeted prevention strategies that brought a 50% reduction in food waste cost and a 45% reduction food waste weight in one year.

At its June banquet in Washington, DC, Sodexo presented LeanPath with its 2018 Vendor of the Year Award in the category of Better Tomorrow 2025, Sodexo’s ambitious corporate responsibility roadmap. We are extremely honored by this recognition. We began a focused partnership with Sodexo in 2010. In 2016 we launched the development of the WasteWatch powered by LeanPath customized food waste tracking platform that is currently being deployed at Sodexo sites worldwide. Judy Panayos, Sodexo’s Senior Director Performance, Sustainability and Corporate Social Responsibility, presented the award and had these blush-worthy comments: