Should We Sell 'Expired Food?'

It was almost a year ago, in June 2015, that Doug Rauch, a former president of Trader Joe’s, opened up Daily Table – a nonprofit operation that sells foods that are nearing their sell-by date and have been donated by food wholesalers and stores to reduce the amount of food waste.

And the trend has spread across the pond to Denmark which has just opened its version, We Food. But unlike Daily Table, all food is past its official expiration date or has damaged packaging that would’ve caused it to be thrown away at a regular store.

In Denmark, 700,000 metric tons of food are discarded every day -- globally it’s 1.3 billion metric tons every day.

Like Daily Table, the store attracts and is designed for low-income customers, however the supermarket also hopes to draw environmentally conscious shoppers.

Denmark throws away 25 percent less food than it did five years ago and many of its supermarkets are also selling food that is near its expiration date at reduced prices. In France, supermarkets are banned from throwing away unsold food and asks restaurants to now provide take-out containers, once considered low-class in the country.

Lots of good news, but some bad as well. Here in the U.S. people are tossing out 50 percent more food these days than they did in 1990.