Reducing Restaurant Food Waste Through Data
Food waste is unarguably a big problem in America; it is estimated that 50% of all food produce is thrown away. This contributes to the societal problems of food shortages, deepening poverty, and harming the environment. A startup company called Spoiler Alert tackles this problem by using software and analytics to reduce food waste from large food retailers, distributors, and manufacturers. The platform identifies ways to get the most value from its unsold products by connecting to a network of vendors and local non-profits that buys the food for a discount, accepts donations, or converts to organic waste.
While this framework has been developed for these larger food companies, there is an opportunity to apply the same kind of methodology to reduce food waste in restaurants around the United States. Restaurants will need to alter their daily operations in order to optimize food usage and reduce waste.
Like the large food companies, restaurants will need to be able to identify and quantify the uncooked and cooked foods being thrown out. One way to achieve this is by using cameras to take pictures of all the plates of food that comes back and use machine learning or algorithms to identify the types of food being wasted and find trends over time. This can also act as feedback to the restaurant by helping them understand what foods the customers do not eat. In addition, leftovers from a day of service can be cataloged and stored in a database along with the wasted foods.
Once these foods have been identified and analyzed over time, the restaurant can find trends that will inform how to stock inventory and allow chefs to refine the menu. Then, by using a similar system to Spoiler Alert, these restaurants can figure out maximize the value of unsold food. They can repackage and sell at a discount to willing consumers or they can donate the food to local NGOs and soup kitchens. This implementation can not only reduce food waste, it can also deepen bonds between the restaurant and the community.
