Dive Brief:
- Giant Eagle is rolling out Flashfood to 140 stores, bringing the food waste-reduction program chainwide to all 173 Giant Eagle and Giant Eagle District Market locations, according to a press release on Tuesday.
- The expansion, which is expected to be completed by the end of October, follows Giant Eagle introducing Flashfood to 34 stores last year and comes a few months after Flashfood raised a $12.3 million Series A funding round.
- Giant Eagle’s work with Flashfood comes as much of the grocery industry is ramping up sustainability efforts, especially to combat food waste, and seeking ways to help customers amid high inflation.
Dive Insight:
Giant Eagle noted that expanding its partnership with Flashfood will make groceries more affordable during a time of high inflation.
With Flashfood, customers can use the program’s free app or website to find food nearing its sell-by date at discounted prices up to 50% off.
Giant Eagle’s renewed focus on value comes at a time when customers are facing high food prices. In June, food-at-home prices spiked 12.2% over the last 12 months and the overall rate of inflation increased 9.1%, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics‘ Consumer Price Index (CPI) data for that month.
The announcement noted that Flashfood allows individual stores to save, on average, more than 1,000 pounds of food per month; reduces shrink for retailers and improves their earnings before interest and taxes by 3% to 5%; and gives regular Flashfood shoppers about $96 in savings per month.
Along with the benefit to consumers’ wallets, the expansion aids Giant Eagle with its sustainability efforts. Giant Eagle and Flashfood project the chainwide adoption of the program will divert 1 million pounds of food waste from landfills by the end of 2022. As part of its sustainability targets, Giant Eagle is aiming to divert 90% of waste from landfills by 2025.
Giant Eagle started rolling out Flashfood to its stores last year. The 34 locations that already have the program diverted more than 430,000 pounds of food waste, according to the press release.
In a late February announcement about its $12.3 million funding round, Flashfood said the U.S. retail sector loses $37 billion annually in value due to food waste from items that don’t get sold by the best-by date. Flashfood said that it plans to use the funds to scale its U.S. presence.
Flashfood is offered in more than 1,200 grocery stores in the U.S. and Canada and, to date, has diverted more than 40 million pounds of food. The food waste reduction program counts The Giant Company, Meijer, Tops Friendly Markets and Giant Food among its retail partners.
