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California first state to ban 'sell by' 'best before' label to reduce food waste

fortune.com

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Re: California first state to ban 'sell by' 'best before' label to reduce food waste

#41

Post by s1artibartfast »

iterateoften wrote: post #17

Maybe grocery stores should be forced to better their inventory control. My “fancy” neighborhood grocery store (upgraded from Vons to Pavilions supposedly as a mark of affluence) I have to check every item because sometimes premade foods like Mac and cheese and those “Kevin” chicken packs are 1-2 months past the best by date. I think food should have a “made on date” in addition. I know on some items you can tell by…

You complain that prices are high, then propose that groceries have inventory restrictions to drive prices up further.

Re: California first state to ban 'sell by' 'best before' label to reduce food waste

#42

Post by devonbleak »

s1artibartfast wrote: post #11

>It will require the use of “Best if Used By” label to signal peak quality and “Use By” label for product safety Who are these people that were confused by "Best by" but understand "best if used by"?

It's not about confusion/clarification it's about legal definition. Currently, because there's no legal definition around it, companies can throw any arbitrary date on a "best by" label on a product. And what we've found is that it's being abused as an artificially short faux expiration date to drive consumers to discard the still-fine-to-consume product and buy another one. This is good for the company who increase their sales but bad for pretty much everybody else because it increases food waste and the energy/resources that were consumed to create it.

Re: California first state to ban 'sell by' 'best before' label to reduce food waste

#43

Post by iterateoften »

s1artibartfast wrote: post #41
iterateoften wrote: post #17

Maybe grocery stores should be forced to better their inventory control. My “fancy” neighborhood grocery store (upgraded from Vons to Pavilions supposedly as a mark of affluence) I have to check every item because sometimes premade foods like Mac and cheese and those “Kevin” chicken packs are 1-2 months past the best by date. I think food should have a “made on date” in addition. I know on some items you can tell by…

You complain that prices are high, then propose that groceries have inventory restrictions to drive prices up further.

Grocery stores overbuy product to have full shelves not to get the best deal for their customer.

Re: California first state to ban 'sell by' 'best before' label to reduce food waste

#44

Post by iterateoften »

mytailorisrich wrote: post #29
iterateoften wrote: post #17

Maybe grocery stores should be forced to better their inventory control. My “fancy” neighborhood grocery store (upgraded from Vons to Pavilions supposedly as a mark of affluence) I have to check every item because sometimes premade foods like Mac and cheese and those “Kevin” chicken packs are 1-2 months past the best by date. I think food should have a “made on date” in addition. I know on some items you can tell by…

> Maybe grocery stores should be forced to better their inventory control. Throwing away stuff is a loss for stores. They don't want to and make a lot of efforts not to. The thing is that it is extremely difficult to impossible, especially when consumers demand full shelves all the time. On the other hand, expired items on shelves is just a shoddy practice.

> especially when consumers demand full shelves

That’s the issue. The quality of our food is nose diving for appearances.

Make regulations that benefit the health of the consumer instead of how many boxes of the same product a corporation can leave sitting on a shelf.

If grocery stores have to change and adapt, so be it.

Re: California first state to ban 'sell by' 'best before' label to reduce food waste

#45

Post by JamesBarney »

rramadass wrote: post #27
DamonHD wrote: post #2

We basically already have this in the UK, and is is helpful. But we still waste too much! One of the local groups that I work with (ish) saves huge amounts of stuff from supermarkets regularly that would otherwise be discarded.

You might find this documentary interesting - https://www.divethefilm.com/ As a person who grew up (and currently live) in India and who spent a decade-and-half in the US, to see the amount of perfectly good food thrown away in the developed world is infuriating and morally inexcusable.

Food waste isn't a problem. If the US threw out 20% less food all the same countries would struggle with food security and hunger. If the US consumed less food, less would be grown. It wouldn't change the price of rice or wheat in India.

Almost all the food imported from the US to India for instance is consumed by the middle class such as tree nuts (almonds) and are not staple foods consumed by those struggling to eat. There isn't that much rice or wheat that's imported. In addition India has lots of tariffs to drive up the price of imported food from the US to protect local farmers. None of the cause of food insecurity is Susie throwing out a mayonnaise container that might be perfectly fine but past the best by date.

Re: California first state to ban 'sell by' 'best before' label to reduce food waste

#46

Post by s1artibartfast »

iterateoften wrote: post #43
s1artibartfast wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You complain that prices are high, then propose that groceries have inventory restrictions to drive prices up further.

Grocery stores overbuy product to have full shelves not to get the best deal for their customer.

Who said anything about best deal?

Either way, throwing out or returning more inventory to make you happy won't help your prices.

Re: California first state to ban 'sell by' 'best before' label to reduce food waste

#47

Post by Suppafly »

mytailorisrich wrote: post #29
iterateoften wrote: post #17

Maybe grocery stores should be forced to better their inventory control. My “fancy” neighborhood grocery store (upgraded from Vons to Pavilions supposedly as a mark of affluence) I have to check every item because sometimes premade foods like Mac and cheese and those “Kevin” chicken packs are 1-2 months past the best by date. I think food should have a “made on date” in addition. I know on some items you can tell by…

> Maybe grocery stores should be forced to better their inventory control. Throwing away stuff is a loss for stores. They don't want to and make a lot of efforts not to. The thing is that it is extremely difficult to impossible, especially when consumers demand full shelves all the time. On the other hand, expired items on shelves is just a shoddy practice.

> especially when consumers demand full shelves all the time

I feel like stores gave up on that post-covid supply chain issues and have never went back to being full. Due to how many options grocery stores carry, they usually have some version of what you want, but they are often sold out of specific brands/sizes still.

Re: California first state to ban 'sell by' 'best before' label to reduce food waste

#48

Post by Suppafly »

s1artibartfast wrote: post #11

>It will require the use of “Best if Used By” label to signal peak quality and “Use By” label for product safety Who are these people that were confused by "Best by" but understand "best if used by"?

>Who are these people that were confused by "Best by" but understand "best if used by"?

Probably the people who have noticed that they aren't used consistently to mean the same thing between brands or even between skus within the same brand.

Re: California first state to ban 'sell by' 'best before' label to reduce food waste

#49

Post by FloatArtifact »

I doubt it'll lead to to difference in food waste reduction. People often forget different dates are not going to change that.

It's an inventory problem, at home and in the grocery store. Barcodes should include all embedded information about the food.

It's abit ridiculous, but imagine checking out at the grocery store. A barcode should be embedded with information on the receipt. A the barcode that allows you to ingest your entire shopping cart in one go. It could contain price, nutritional information, serving size, band and so on. Scan one bar coat with your phone and update your home inventory. It's all a matter of infrastructure.

Re: California first state to ban 'sell by' 'best before' label to reduce food waste

#50

Post by s1artibartfast »

devonbleak wrote: post #42
s1artibartfast wrote: post #11

>It will require the use of “Best if Used By” label to signal peak quality and “Use By” label for product safety Who are these people that were confused by "Best by" but understand "best if used by"?

It's not about confusion/clarification it's about legal definition. Currently, because there's no legal definition around it, companies can throw any arbitrary date on a "best by" label on a product. And what we've found is that it's being abused as an artificially short faux expiration date to drive consumers to discard the still-fine-to-consume product and buy another one. This is good for the company who increase…

They still can. There is no definition and it is at the manufacturers discretion. The law changed absolutely nothing about how best by dates are determined, just the wording.

The law literally is about the wording.

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