HelloFresh donates more than 3m EUR to food banks across the world in response to ongoing pandemic

Supporting less fortunate households in having access to fresh, wholesome meals is of great importance to us. Therefore, HelloFresh has been cooperating closely with local food banks for many years now, as we donate the vast majority of edible, unsold ingredients to local charitable organizations, directly benefiting people who face food insecurity. 

Throughout the past months and in response to the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic, we decided to step up our efforts. We made donations valued at over 3 Million Euros to our food bank partners. These donations included: 

• Contributions of surplus food
• 170.000 € cash support 
• Donations of HelloFresh meal kits to low-income communities and healthcare workers 

In the first quarter of 2020 we shipped 111 million meals to our customers. So where does the surplus food come from? 

In our facilities, less than 1% of all purchased ingredients go to waste, as we have perfected our supply chain by applying modern machine-learning techniques that continuously improve forecasting accuracy and minimize food waste. Even though we are already very good at this, there may be some surplus ingredients left over at the end of the week, because of small buffer volumes, for example. But let me break that down for you: 

• On average, the groceries of a HelloFresh box weigh 621g
• During production, only 3.6g of the 621g go to waste (in a few cases, the quality of the ingredients isn’t up to our high standards) 
• Another 8.5g are donated - which is where our partner food banks come into action

We’ve felt incredibly proud to support so many families around the world with fresh ingredients and affordable, delicious meals during the ongoing pandemic, so this is just a small way of giving back to communities that have welcomed us over the last years.

I would like to thank all of the organizations for their ongoing hard work and support in making sure that everybody has access to a nutritious, warm meal!