1.3 billion tons of food are wasted every year, amounting to $1 trillion USD of wasted or lost food. But why is food waste bad? Food waste increases methane gasses released from an environment of unnatural decomposition when in landfills and a waste of natural resources like: water and land used to farm the food, oil and fossil fuels used to transport and manufacture the food; not to mention the negative impacts on global hunger when food is wasted. 

In times of COVID, it’s been a battle trying to find a grocery store that doesn’t have a week long waiting list for pick-up service, or a teenage kid filling your order that doesn’t realize there’s a big difference between cucumber and zucchini.

In comes Imperfect Foods. A food subscription box that delivers weekly or bi-weekly and promises produce at a rate of 30% lower than your average grocer. How? I’m glad you asked!

Imperfect Foods purchases their produce directly from farmers after the grocery stores and local markets have purchased the most “perfect” or “consistent” items. You’d be surprised on how many avocados a national grocery chain will pass on because they are a little too round, or how many carrots don’t make the cut because they are a little too stubby.

But wait! There’s more!

Imperfect Foods doesn’t just have produce… they have dried goods like tri-color quinoa whose ratio of grains are not up to the industry standards, spread and jams due to excess inventory, or canned tomatoes with labels that are obsolete due to new merchandising standards.

I like to think of Imperfect Foods as my own personal shopping experience, instead of a box of surplus produce. I can pick and choose what is delivered every week, as long as I customize my box within my customization window (three days), and I can even set up foods that I’d like to automatically be added to my box on a recurring schedule, just in case I get busy or lazy and forget to customize my box.

Want to try Imperfect Foods? Sign up here and get $10 off your first box!