Assembly lines, portion control, and pre-prepared entrées are all standard practices in fast food restaurants, making your $1 burger, fries, and milkshake a reality. However, since these establishments receive their food shipments in bulk from regional suppliers, they must order an excess of food to account for changes in consumer demand. This means that while profit margins are extremely narrow, reducing food waste remains an uphill battle. In fact, a 2005 University of Arizona study found that 9 percent of food is wasted at fast food establishments, while the largest ones average about half that figure.
Solving perishable food waste from the “just-in-time” delivery perspective is a complicated, albeit effective approach, but a recent trip to Starbucks convinced me that even in this hyper-competitive industry, there’s still some low-hanging fruit.
As I waited for my coffee, I couldn’t help but notice the leftover Frappuccino sitting in the bottom of Starbucks’ blender that didn’t make it to the customer’s cup. It was only a few ounces, and they were soon washed away as the barista filled the blender with hot water. Food waste is a fact of life anywhere you go whether it’s the fault of the restaurant or consumer, but it’s particularly annoying to see food wasted just minutes after being prepared when it easily could have been given to the customer. Starbucks might still be in expansion mode, but you would think that a publicly traded company would have more incentive to operate more efficiently.
This experience also got me thinking how other fast food restaurants might get around this problem. McDonalds, for example, blends its smoothies in the same cup that is served to customers, eliminating product waste, food-allergy concerns, flavor transfer, and the time and resources spent cleaning pitchers. Starbucks might need to seek a solution more befitting of its coffee-house image, but across its 17,000+ locations worldwide, this preventable pre-consumer waste must surely add up.
