Job Perk: Free Ice Cream
Even with all of the complexities with agricultural value chains products that are of high quality and produced to spec the pathway is still relatively straight forward. The story gets very convoluted when goods that cannot or should not be sold to consumers are produced.
If all of these products are discarded, it is difficult for producers and manufacturers to stay profitable. Plus, it creates a terrible food waste story. In fact, one of the reasons, I started working in the value chain was that I was looking for addition buyers of excess or low-quality farm products to increase the profitability of diversified farms. These products might not work direct-to-consumer, but when lightly processed they are still sellable.
Employee Perk
As I've gotten deeper into the value chain, I've seen how different companies manage these products. Some companies sell the mistakes at a discount, if you've taken a Jelly Belly factor tour, you probably bought Belly Flops (or misshapen Jelly Belly Beans) for a big discount on your way out. Today's solution is to use the excess as an employee perk. I've seen this on farms, small distributors, and even large consumer packaged goods companies.
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The first time I noticed it was with my specialty meat client. When the owner gets product in that is incorrect or isn't sold, he hosts a lunch after the difficult Sunday shift. After they finish working on Sunday mornings the group prepares lunch and eats together. The owner provides the space for lunch, the meat, and the cooking equipment. The employees bring sides and drinks. If there are extras, it gets divided up among the team. It builds comradery without costing the owner much.
My client is not the only business that provides this type of perk to their employees. Recently, a Subscriber episode of Planet Money investigated the ice cream barter economy that is thriving in Vermont because one of the perks of working at Ben & Jerry's ice cream is that you get three free pints of ice cream per day. This adds up to a lot of ice cream and could be expensive for the company. However, most of the time the ice cream is less-than-perfect. The ingredient ratio might be off. Or, when they were changing the machines from one flavor to another, the two got mixed. These pints can't be sold but are perfectly good to enjoy.
Humans & Robots
As consumers we can expect that every pint is exactly the same. I was interested in the different ways that ice cream can be less-than-perfect. The mixing errors make sense. The one that stood out was the mixed flavors from factory change overs. When exploring heritage grain milling, I was concerned with finding the expertise to run a mill efficiently, in other words - not have to throw away batches because grains were mixed together. I assume that these products would not be given to consumers, but probably sold as animal feed.
EO/IR synthetic imagery & transient thermal predictive simulation at ThermoAnalytics, Inc.
2 年Three pints of ice cream per day? That's roughly 225 grams, or half a pound, of sugar.
educator | communications | marketing | strategic planning | business development
2 年I'm passionate about decreasing food waste. While it is a deeply complex issue, we were recently discussing a simple example with our kids. At one time, our local general convenient store/gas station would pass out the leftovers at 11pm each night. This was stopped several years ago and remains so. Health department regulations were cited as the reason. A newer gas station in town has begun the old tradition. I plan to update myself on our county's regulations and now question the true motivation. However, as we talked I couldn't help but think about the heaps of food which have went to the dumpster while reminiscing about feeding students in need as I served as a substitute teacher. Such a need that could be solved by reducing food waste. Have you noticed this happening in your area?
Environmental Economist | Strategic Planner | Researcher | Collaborator
2 年This gets me thinking about a question I have had for a while. Yes, some shrink and waste is unavoidable. Some irregular produce are impossible to avoid. But some product imperfections can be improved with more support from ag extension and food and kitchen incubators. E.g. our team saw direct-to-consumer beef that had bad flavor because it wasn’t shrink wrapped properly. And there are some new value added products that emerge with terrible recipes. I have found it to be a delicate balance of 2 things when dealing with excess production working with farmers and food businesses: when do we need to educate the producer about better quality control? And when do we need to educate the consumer on having different standards for the quality of their food (often with produce and certain meat cuts)?
Ski Pro, MS/MBA, CAMS
2 年If all value chains included an ice cream component, economics would be the most popular subject!! Cheers for these leaders who see value is small, thoughtful measures that yield dividends well beyond a balance sheet. Thank you Michelle!
Entrepreneur, Social Business Architect, Connector, Convener, Facilitator - Innovation, Global Development, Sustainability
2 年In case you have not been following the trend already, Michelle, it is often possible to order "blind boxes" of products nearing expiry date from food retailers in Mainland China, typically at steep (sometimes 10-fold or greater) discount. While PareUp and others have been around in the States for some years by now, they appear to face impediments to reaching similar scale, though it must be said that the boom in blind boxes reflect deteriorating economic outlook amongst Mainland Chinese more than any sustainability imperative. I look forward to further insights from your end. Yael Rozencwajg Maya Zuckerman