What’s Foodsharing? — An Interview With A German Founder.

We spoke with a founder of a Foodsharing Initiative from Germany. Basti (26 years) etablished a Foodsharing plattform in January 2019. Since then he and his friend made big steps in fighting food waste in his hometown Bremerhaven.

How did you get into food sharing?

I started in 2018. Through my girlfriend at the time, who had a very sustainable and conscious diet, I started eating vegan and paying more attention to how I consume. Especially the big waste of food, which my friend pointed out to me, motivated me to handle food better and more sustainably.

In the course of 2018, I then dealt with the topic more consciously and started to dumpster dive which is collecting thrown away food from the trash cans of supermarkets. But since we collected far more food than we could use for our private consumption, we shared it with our friends and roommates. Then we realized that we could share more food with more people by far.

All that was missing was a location where we could make the food accessible to everyone.

With Findus [a restaurant whose payment system is based on solidarity], a restaurant was created in Bremerhaven that was the first zhat thought of sustainably. Inspired by the many food sharing platforms across Germany, we took the initiative and spoke to the owners of the restaurant. They found our idea appealing and appropriate, since they also thought about adding an “Unverpackt”-shop [unwrapped, a supermarket with no plastic waste] to their restaurant. From the outset, they were very impressed with our idea and our commitment.

2. What motivated you to participate in food sharing?

My previous actions made me angry. Precious foods are being thrown away everywhere. My roommate often went dumster diving to save food. And the bad thing is that saving food in Germany continues to be punishable. So I asked myself the question:

Is it fair if, in times of global warming and increasing resource scarcity, waste goes unpunished and thrift becomes a crime?

If we look at the fact that 18.4 million tons of edible food end up in the garbage in Germany, that’s too much. That is why we started asking local bakeries, supermarkets and local weekly markets whether there was a willingness to save food. The feedback was positive. Many of the distributors were even happy that they no longer had to take care of their unsold groceries. Accordingly, the influx and charges were overwhelming in the first few weeks. What you can see from our photos on Instagram.

3. What were the obstacles / difficulties for you at the beginning?

Since we had found motivated volunteerns very quickly thanks to Findus, who provided us with a place to store and offer the saved food, we didn’t really have a problem with that. The biggest hurdle for us was to mobilize people to come over. And even that was a relatively small obstacle due to the location. Since the restaurant is located in Bremerhaven’s pub street, which is also inhabited by many students, we were able to quickly inform them about the new location and set up via Facebook groups. Since we, as students, knew the problems ourselves that money could sometimes be tight in the end, it was easy to give away bread, vegetables and fruit.

We also had an interview with one of our local newspaper, where we asked for more volunteers to help us. After that article was published we noticed that a lot of people were attracted by our offerings. So that article really helped us in raising awareness and also attracedt more people outside of the student bubble.

Since our food sharing platform is organized on a voluntary basis, it is important to create clear work distributions. Since we try to get new groceries from bakeries, supermarkets and weekly markets every day, a volunteer has to be ready to collect the groceries every day. In the beginning it mostly fell back on me or my girlfriend. That can be very time-consuming. But we were lucky here too. Due to the large number of students, a plan was quickly created that regulates when which person picks up the products.

Financially, we didn’t need much money, for example we built the shelves for the vegetables from old furniture. Our presence on Instagram and Facebook is free for us. So we post every day and within a few hours the products are out of stock. The only negative aspect is that we occasionally have to use the car to transport it. But here, too, the expenses are in a relatively small area. And most of the time we try to use the cargo bike for transport.

4. How did you get in contact with the donors? How reliable are the voluntary contributions? How do you communicate?

We have a weekly farmers market in Geestemünde [District in Bremerhaven]. This takes place on Saturdays. So for many of the traders, the last chance is to sell their older vegetables and fruits. However, there are often a lot of remains. We then went from booth to booth and asked if the dealers were interested in voluntary donations. And the response was positive. Of course, the portions and the offer can vary from week to week. However, that also makes things exciting and you have to be more creative when processing.

We asked several local, small bakeries whether they would like to donate their bread. And we were lucky here too. Old bread and rolls are very difficult or even illegal to sell on the second day leading to daily donations. I would almost say that is why we have the most reliable donations and a large selection of bread and even cakes every day.

The whole thing looks worse at supermarkets. Large chains usually have guidelines from group management and are not as flexible. Accordingly, their food donations are very volatile.

In general, we have agreed fixed fees with the donors. We come to the weekly market every Saturday, to the bakery every day. The supermarkets are a little more volatile. We mainly communicate over the phone. That is very unproblematic.

5. How much work do you put into the project on a voluntary basis? Are there any people who can help you with this?

As I said, it was very time-consuming in the beginning, but as soon as more volunteers got involved and we created a schedule, it became less.

6. Which social network would you describe as the most important for you and why? How did you mobilize people?

I would say Instagram was the most helpful. The story function gives each of our subscribers an update in real time of the range of free groceries we have every day. For the simple reason of showing availabilty of different foods Facebook is rather lame, since many first have to open the app and then have to look specifically at our page or our group. That’s why I would rather recommend Instagram.

We also created events via the platforms, such as Cooking evenings where we cooked the saved food together for many people.

7. What kind of feedback did you get from the many users?

Consistently positive. The location turned out to be a complete success. In addition to the students who came first, we were able to engage many of the customers who eat in the restaurant. Since our vegetables and fruits do not match the offer in the “Unverpackt”-shop, we complement many purchases. Customers who already consciously avoid plastic and maybe shop for pasta or cereals, stop and take free vegetables or fruit with them. It works really well.

8. What would you do differently if you had known it beforehand?

I would have started earlier, if I had known how much food I could have saved.

No. Seriously: In the beginning it was very time consuming. We would not have been able to do this if we would have been employed. So you need a lot of time.