Dive Brief:
- Alimentation Couche-Tard has expanded its partnership with social impact company Too Good To Go, adding Circle K locations in the United States, Canada, Ireland, and Poland to the latter’s app, according to a Thursday announcement from the companies.
- An estimated 9,000-plus Circle K and Couche-Tard sites should be included in the app by the end of the year. That’s up from about 1,300 before this expansion, roughly half of which were in North America, a Circle K spokesperson said. While certain markets in the U.S., Canada and Poland were already using Too Good To Go, this expansion represents its “most extensive rollout to date,” according to the announcement.
- Through the app, stores can create “Surprise Bags,” in which they package food that is nearing its expiration date. The bags are then sold to users of the app at discounts of at least 50%.
Dive Insight:
While the mission of Too Good To Go is to reduce food waste and help the environment, for convenience stores like Circle K the integration can also turn what would have been trash into money.
"Businesses unlock value from their surplus and avoid food waste; at the same time, users enjoy great value for money, while making a real, tangible difference to help tackle climate change," said Mette Lykke, CEO of Too Good To Go.
The discounted prices could help draw more customers into stores through the app as well, with Americans still feeling the squeeze of an extended period of food inflation.
Couche-Tard and Denmark-based Too Good To Go began working together in Norway in 2018 and have gradually expanded over the intervening years to Denmark, Sweden and select markets in the United States, Canada and Poland. In North America, the partnership began with about 70 stores in the company’s Eastern Canada and Heartland business units, mainly in Chicago, St. Louis and Montreal, the Circle K spokesperson said. This latest expansion will bring additional regions in the U.S., Canada and Poland, along with all of Ireland, into the program in stages through the rest of this year.
Too Good To Go has 95 million registered users on its app worldwide, as well as 160,000 active partners in 17 countries.
This isn’t the only way convenience stores tackle food waste. Maverik partners with hunger relief nonprofit Feeding America to donate surplus food to food banks, while companies like Casey’s General Stores are applying technology to forecasting in an attempt to reduce the amount of food that’s ordered but not eaten.
Laval, Quebec-based Couche-Tard, parent company of Circle K, operates more than 5,700 c-stores in the U.S. It is the second-largest c-store company in North America behind 7-Eleven.
