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Erase Food Waste: Prepare

Design a solution to your problem. Research and brainstorm possible solutions to the problem. Be creative and daring. Your first idea doesn’t have to be perfect.

Tips from your Challenge Champion

Oscar Ekponimo is the founder and CEO of Chowberry. Watch this video to learn what experts like Oscar think is important to consider when developing a socially conscious food business.

Helpful Resources on Food and Marketing

Explore factors that can affect the success of your solution.

Understanding Food Waste:

  • What’s the problem? This video will help you learn more about the food waste problem. 
  • Why waste food? Read this article to learn about the reasons so much food is wasted in the United States: Why Americans Lead the World in Food Waste
  • What is “ugly” food? We waste a lot of food that is safe to eat because it’s “ugly.” Below are several examples of ugly fruits and vegetables.
Beneath the bruises - A new market for old and ugly fruit and ...
Ugly Fruits and Veggies ~ Grow Appalachia

Marketing Ugly Foods: Use these resources to learn how some companies are marketing ugly foods to reduce food waste.

Using Sliding Price Scales: Use these resources to learn how companies, like farms, grocery stores, and restaurants, are using sliding price scales to tackle food waste. Be careful; these examples use sliding price scales to get more customers, which may or may not reduce food waste.

Steps for Building a Sliding Price Scale:

  1. Conducting Market Research
  2. Building Your Sliding Price Scale and Showing How Your Sliding Price Scale Works

Math Resources and Tools

Use this spreadsheet resource to build your Sliding Price Scale and show how it would work with a real example.