Costa Coffee expands food waste prevention services across UK

Costa Coffee is expanding a partnership with an anti-food-waste app to offer customers the chance to purchase surplus food from more than 1,100 stores across the UK, having saved 250 tonnes of carbon emissions through the existing collaboration.


Costa Coffee expands food waste prevention services across UK

To date

Costa Coffee’s partnership with the Too Good To Go app dates back to 2018 and has seen more than 100,000 food collection bags collected across UK stores. The bags prevent unsold food from going to waste by offering discounted bundles to customers via the app.

The partnership has now been extended with collection available across more than 1,100 participating stores in the UK.

To date, the partnership has prevented 250 tonnes of CO2 emissions – equivalent to more than 1,000 flights from London to Berlin – while the wider Too Goof To Go app has saved more than 60 million meals from going to waste globally. Costa Coffee runs numerous redistribution schemes, in partnership with Cranswick and OLIO for example, across the UK.

A Costa Coffee spokesperson said: “We’re delighted to expand our partnership with Too Good To Go, offering customers the chance to purchase food that would otherwise have gone to waste. We are committed to playing our part in reducing food waste across our business and supporting the communities we operate in, whether that’s by working directly with organisations such as Too Good To Go or donating surplus food to local charities. In 2019, we also made a public commitment to reduce food waste by signing up to the Step Up to the Plate Pledge and the Food Waste Reduction Roadmap.

“It’s amazing to think that by working with Too Good to Go, we’ve saved enough CO2e emissions to charge a smartphone over 44 million times! Here’s to more amazing stats as we extend the partnership nationwide.” 

Costa Coffee is a corporate member of the Department for Food, Environment and Rural Affairs’ (Defra) ‘Step up to the Plate’ pledge, which commits signatories to halving their food waste output by 2030.

By signing the pledge, Costa has additionally committed to using its voice to empower the public and drive wider behaviour change aimed at tackling the UK’s annual food waste mountain of 10.2 million tonnes.

More broadly, the UK Government last year issued a £3.25m redistribution fund across England to help organisations cut back on food waste by redistributing surplus stock during the coronavirus outbreak.

The Defra-funded grant will be managed by WRAP and all food redistribution businesses and charities can bid for grants over the coming months. The Government hopes that up to 14,000 tonnes of surplus stock can be redistributed to organisations impacted by social distancing measures and those unable to access usual commercial support networks.

Matt Mace

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