WastED - A Waste and Recycling Podcast by SWACO

Turning Food Waste into Opportunities for Central Ohio Restaurants

• Hanna Greer-Brown

Share episode

A million pounds of food waste enters Central Ohio's landfill every single day. Let that sink in. Beyond the environmental impact, this waste represents a staggering economic drain - the average family of four tosses away $2,000 worth of uneaten food annually.

When Joe and Hanna sat down with Sara Gallaugher, SWACO's Food Waste Program Administrator, we knew we needed to address the hidden crisis of wasted food but what you'll find in this conversation is a remarkable opportunity, too. Local restaurants like Bud Dairy Food Hall, Kittie's Cakes, and Joya's have joined our Food Waste Champion program with stunning results - diverting 20,000 pounds of food waste from landfills in just six months through simple but effective composting practices.

The beauty of this initiative lies in its accessibility. SWACO provides comprehensive support including free containers, signage, education, and covers six months of hauling costs for businesses ready to take the leap. Sara emphasizes that solutions aren't one-size-fits-all - whether it's a food hall managing ten chef partners or a neighborhood bakery - successful food waste diversion can be customized to fit any operation.

This episode doesn't stop at restaurants though. We explore practical strategies for homes (shop your fridge first!), schools (set up smart cafeteria systems), and businesses (host zero-waste events). The goal isn't perfection, as progress can start small: with simple changes like properly dating leftovers and freezing foods before they spoil. Ready to join the movement? Visit SaveMoreThanFood.org for resources and connect with SWACO to learn how you can turn your food waste into opportunity.

Speaker 1:

Welcome to Waste Ed, a waste and recycling podcast by SWACO. Welcome to Episode 9 of Waste Ed, a podcast brought to you by SWACO. I'm Hannah Greer-Brown, Director of Communications.

Speaker 2:

And I'm Joe Lombardi, Executive Director at SWACO.

Speaker 1:

Well, Joe, I don't want to jinx us, but it seems we have finally hit our stride with warm temperatures in central Ohio. On weekends, families are outdoors and you can smell the grills being fired up, and I see a lot of people planting tomatoes, peppers and all kinds of herbs right now.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I'm still trying to figure out when's a good time to start my garden. I call it a garden it's a little patched, I put some tomatoes in every year, but also, not to mention, restaurant patios are humming and with diners getting food and sides of sunshine. But something that's not talked about too much is the prevalence of wasted food in our community.

Speaker 1:

That's right. Nearly a million pounds of food waste arrives at the local landfill every single day. Again, that's a million pounds every day. That's staggering and is the very focus of today's podcast chat. With us today is SWACO's very own Sarah Gallagher Food Waste Program Administrator. Welcome to the show. Thank you so much for having me.

Speaker 2:

Sarah, let's start with a stat A million pounds of food waste per day, which also equates to our single largest source of landfill material. Set the stage for our listeners. Why is this a problem?

Speaker 3:

Wasted food also wastes money and all the resources that went into growing it, processing it and transporting it. Food waste also shortens the life of the landfill by filling it up with things that could be donated or composted.

Speaker 2:

And you know that's what a lot of people don't realize is that there's an economic issue with food waste as well, and we'll probably get to that later in the podcast. But a little bit of a background on me. I grew up and spent some time in my life around restaurant industry helping my dad and my brother with our family business. Sarah, I know enough to be dangerous, so that's why we have you on today. This industry is really hard overall and there will always be a certain amount of waste from restaurant kitchens. Still, there's a lot that area restaurants are doing in this space. Can you tell our listeners a little bit more about what we're doing with restaurants?

Speaker 3:

Absolutely Well. I'm really excited about what the restaurants are doing in this space. Now we are excited to be working with a lot of restaurants for our Food Waste Champion program, which we'll talk about more in a little bit.

Speaker 1:

That's great, and restaurants are such an important part of our Save More Than Food program that we launched several years ago. Really, we aim to help residents and businesses reduce food waste at home, at work and at local businesses. The initiative has dozens of local partners and has been recognized nationally. And now, sarah, as you mentioned, we're expanding that program with the help of several eateries who have piloted new composting Cameron, mitchell's, bud Dairy Food Hall, kitty's Cakes and Joya's in Worthington have all been part of that effort. Why were these?

Speaker 3:

businesses selected and were they a good fit for the initiative? Bud Dairy Food Hall was a great fit because we got to work with their 10 chef partners, two bars and a general manager that was really excited about the program. The Food Waste Champion pilot program really showed us that food halls can donate and collect food scraps for composting. In downtown Worthington, kitties and Joyas showed that two established shipments can co-collect together. Kitties was already collecting their food scraps and transporting them to their bakery in German Village and they were excited to no longer need to transport those food scraps. Joyas started collecting for the first time. During this program. We worked with the front and back of house at Joyas to collect as much organics as possible and back of house at Joya's to collect as much organics as possible. When we did the post-waste audit we actually found that they now divert 58% of their organic materials.

Speaker 1:

That's great.

Speaker 2:

So in the first six months of the PIDA project, if I remember you telling me, bud Dairy, joya's and Kitty's Cakes of Worthington diverted a huge amount of food waste from our landfill. Can you share that number with our listeners?

Speaker 3:

20,000 pounds of food waste was diverted, wow.

Speaker 2:

And how did they save that much? What did they do to save 20,000 pounds of food waste?

Speaker 3:

The crazy part, Joe. It actually was pretty easy. They started collecting it. They didn't have containers or anything beforehand, they started collecting it. There was definitely some pivots that had to happen during the program, but the team worked together.

Speaker 2:

So, Sarah, you spoke about the 20,000 pounds that was saved in that first six months. Were these businesses surprised by that number in such a short period of time?

Speaker 3:

They were. They were very surprised and excited. I would say it made them excited for what was next, and this was a pilot program we were doing, and so they are committed now.

Speaker 1:

Well, I really love this work that we were able to do with these three restaurants. Let's dive in a little bit to what exactly Bud, Dairy, Joyas and Kitties did during a typical week during the food waste pilot. Can you walk us through that?

Speaker 3:

million pounds that we talked about earlier.

Speaker 3:

We talked about that. They were excited. So what we did then was actually a pre-audit of their waste streams with Green Scope Consulting. After that audit was done which was really interesting we had employees coming out and seeing what was in those containers. That were happening during the audit and so they really got to see that some of those things shouldn't be going to the landfill. After that we gave them five-gallon containers, five-gallon buckets, with a really cool sticker on them that showed what should go in the bins and what shouldn't.

Speaker 3:

And when you're working with a restaurant, really it's those gloves, it's the spoons that they taste things with, it's the stickers on the produce. So we really tried to make it specific for restaurants. After we did that, we did a whole education to them. We talked about what would happen to this food waste. Afterwards, All the employees got on board really excited, and then I would just come in randomly see how it was going, check on people and get to have conversations around it. And they worked with the compost exchange to have their waste picked up, and compost exchange was always willing to have conversations with them if there was contamination, which, when a business starts out, there's going to be that. So instead of just throwing in the towel and being done with it, we pivoted. We had conversations Like I said before, we're here to help and then we actually did a post audit, which was very interesting to see.

Speaker 3:

All that wasn't in the landfill stream anymore, so you didn't see those onion peels and collard greens and all the things that were organics. Not only was it food waste, really, it was also those napkins and things that you can put into the organics collection, the food waste bin. So it was really exciting and we got to see great results at both locations. The Worthington locations aren't. At Joya's specifically, they're not collecting front of house as much. They are having the people who work there are sorting it. So it's not like a consumer is deciding where things go, but Dairy Hall they're actually open containers for their patrons to put the things in it. So it's a big thing, right, Like which bin do I put it in? Do I put it in the landfill? Do I put it in the compost? So we're still kind of working on that, but they're committed to it.

Speaker 2:

And it's not a cookie cutter solution. We're flexible enough to say, hey, if it didn't work for you on this particular program, we can try it this way, right? So I mean, it's not a cookie cutter program, no pun intended, but you're willing to work with anyone and just make it work, no matter how big or how small.

Speaker 3:

Absolutely so. We also work with corporations. So if they have a cafeteria in a corporation, we're working with Worthington Enterprises directly. They are now composting in their cafeteria. So with food waste specifically, it's different right than recycling. It's not one size fits all by any means, and so it really is looking at how can we make it work for them. My whole job is to divert food waste from the landfill.

Speaker 1:

I don't want nearly a million pounds to be coming here and I imagine signage is such an important part of the equation, right, and I know your team has a lot of signage available to restaurants that they can just download that from our website and it employs all of the best practices. Can you talk a little bit about maybe the types of signage somebody who's dining out at Bud Dairy might see? That might make their decisions about what to put in the composting bin a little easier.

Speaker 3:

Absolutely. Like I said before, it's different than the back of house, right? So the front of house is different. At recyclerightorg we have our sign maker tool and right on there you can actually customize it for a restaurant or establishment or your home or your school anywhere. But then what you're going to see on there is you're going to see all those food scraps, you're going to see bakery items, you're going to see meat and dairy, you're going to see the napkins and compostable plates and utensils and things like that. So it is different. It doesn't have necessarily those stickers and things, but yeah, it has all that information and anybody could customize it or you can use the ones that we have already made.

Speaker 2:

So I would just say that any business, big or small, that is really contemplating doing this, even if you just want to try it, give Sarah a call. Sarah will come in and she will do everything she can to make it work for your particular business. This is a great segue into the next question. We started with these restaurants and we want to expand that Now. I'm not going to put this on your performance review, but how many restaurants do you think we could get by the end of this year?

Speaker 3:

More than 10, I'm going to say, all right, I mean, I think that we're looking forward to as many as possible, right? So I hope to work definitely with more than 10. So I'm just going to be conservative there on my count.

Speaker 2:

Well, Hannah, we know, if you ask Sarah to do something, she's going to not only do it she's going to double it.

Speaker 1:

I hope so Well, I love that you mentioned that several of those restaurants were doing composting in front and back of house operations, because I think that's really unique. And let's also mention that SWACO is able to cover initial startup costs and the first six months of hauling costs through our business food waste champions initiative that you started to speak about earlier. So, again, we're just trying to make it easy and attractive for restaurants to participate in a composting program. So, sarah, can you pick up on that a little bit and explain how we want to help restaurants compost more and maybe how they can even reach out to us if they're interested in learning more?

Speaker 3:

Absolutely so like you said, not only do we reimburse for six months of service, but we also give free indoor containers, signs and education. I'll come and do a visual audit, we'll talk about it. We'll talk about how you can donate, because obviously that's what we want. First, right, we want to feed people and then, if they what they can't donate, we can help them compost. So we give them a list of haulers and really walk with them hand in hand.

Speaker 1:

I love that. It seems like it's pretty painless for a restaurant to get started and it seems like we hold their hand through every step of the process and make it really easy for them. We try.

Speaker 2:

And Sarah, you know we spent some time here talking about Save More Than Food campaign for businesses, but in reality, savemorethanfoodorg has all kinds of tips for each of those pillars that we give information to and resources here at SWACO homes, schools, work locations. Tell our listeners how some of these other pillars, how can they do some composting, whether you're doing it at home or whether you're doing it in your schools, in your cafeterias or even your business a zero waste event. What else can we do to help our listeners do a better job of composting and saving food scraps?

Speaker 3:

We actually have a whole website dedicated to that at savemorethanfoodorg. It has great tips and tricks for composting at home. Composting at home, you can do either backyard composting, curbside composting or visit more than one of our 30 food waste drop-off locations. Regarding schools, setting up the cafeterias up for success at the beginning of when those cafeterias are going in is really the best way to do it, but we have our school business program administrator who can help with that as well as I can help with that, so just reach out to us here at SWACO. Regarding businesses and zero waste events, we do have a container loan program and we also have a lot of great information again at the savemorethanfoodorg for businesses to have those zero waste events and you can join again that Food Waste Champions program and we'll walk you through all of that. I love throwing zero waste events, so I'm excited, like I said a little bit ago, to have one myself soon for graduation.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, we know. Here at SWACO we have a piece of equipment in our kitchen and if Sarah is in the kitchen and you have any food scraps on your plate, you better put it in that piece of equipment or Sarah will write you up. So we thank you for all you do here at SWACO and what you do in our communities as well. You know we mentioned a million pounds of food waste coming to our landfill every day. That's a big number. That's a big number. But here's another one that goes straight to the pocketbook. We talked about the economics of food waste. Every year, the average family of four spends $2,000 on food that is purchased but never eaten. So I'm curious how can homes and the food industry do a better job on the front end of buying enough food but not too much to where it is wasted?

Speaker 3:

Pre-planning as much as you can is the most important thing, and when that food is going to be wasted, make sure it goes to people first and then gets composted and turned into nutrient-rich soil. Food waste should be a circular system and kept out of the landfill.

Speaker 2:

And Hannah, make sure you shop with a list and not-.

Speaker 1:

I was just thinking about that. I love that Sarah mentioned a circular economy, because composting really is the last thing we want residents and partners to do. So let's talk a little bit about the other prevention and recovery activities that you can do at home, such as shopping with a list, like Joe mentioned, meal planning, donations. Sarah, can you give us a couple of tips or recommendations that you would make Absolutely A great thing?

Speaker 3:

that I do at home is put dates on my leftovers so that I know when I need to eat those and not throw them away Again. Like you said, make a shopping list but really shop your refrigerator and pantry first. Oh, I love that and I would say learn more about date labels. Best Buy and Used by dates aren't quite what we think they are.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, what about the tip of freezing? I've heard you can freeze leftover foods for up to six months. Is that generally a bit of advice that you would give someone who's listening Absolutely.

Speaker 3:

Something I started doing this year for the first time was taking clementines before they got frozen, rotten or anything, and I'd peel them and throw them in a container and use them for smoothies later on. So I had not ever thought of that before. I don't know why, and I try to eat them obviously first, but they make great smoothies that add a little bit of citrus.

Speaker 1:

Okay, that's great. Well, let's wrap it up this way we always want to be cognizant that Ohioans are busy, our friends and neighbors work hard, are committed to their families, schools and their communities, so we don't ever want to overwhelm anyone with you've got to do this or that. We always say start small and let it build. So, sarah, what are some other small ways to start reducing and composting food waste?

Speaker 3:

One of the best things I think you can do is eating the food on your plate. We have a whole campaign right now called Fresh Takes that you can find at savemorethanfoodorg. That gives recipes on how to use those items on your plate if you're going to use them again in another recipe.

Speaker 1:

I love to get creative with leftovers. That's a great way.

Speaker 2:

I'm a leftover king yeah.

Speaker 2:

I love leftovers. Had a leftover cheeseburger for lunch yesterday, just so everybody knows, sarah, I know I speak for Hannah and myself when I say thank you for joining us here today. This was such an informative conversation and I know our listeners probably learned at least one thing from you and from this conversation and to our listeners. If you'd like to know more about what we do, visit our website anytime at swacoorg. We also want to hear from you If you have ideas for future podcast episodes. Connect with us on any of our social channels and you can always drop us an email Until the next time. This is Waste Ed, a waste and recycling podcast by Swayco.