Starbucks joins Walmart, Sodexo and others in pact to cut food waste

A major initiative to cut food waste got a boost this week when Starbucks announced it was joining Walmart, Sodexo and others in becoming a member. With more than 15,000 U.S. stores, Starbucks is the largest quick-serve restaurant, or QSR, to sign up for the U.S. Food Waste Pact.

“Food waste happens across the supply chain,” said Jackie Suggitt, vice president of business initiatives and community engagement at ReFED, a food waste non-profit that runs the pact with the WWF. “Targeting the QSR subsector broadens our impact and action in reducing food waste systemwide.”

Over a third of all food goes unsold or uneaten in the U.S, which ReFED frames as a $250 billion opportunity for food businesses. It’s also a big climate issue: ReFED estimates that food waste is responsible for 6 percent of all U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, in part because decomposing food emits methane, a powerful greenhouse gas. Food waste also consumes more than a fifth of the nation’s freshwater supply.

The percentage of food sales has grown steadily at Starbucks over the years, accounting for 23 percent globally of total sales in 2024, according to Statista.

“Our initial objective through this pact is to share best practices, drive innovation and work with peers to create a more resilient and sustainable food system, both within Starbucks and across the sector,” said a Starbucks spokesperson.

Other pact members besides Starbucks include Ahold Delhaize USA, ALDI US, Amazon Fresh, Aramark, Bob’s Red Mill, Chick-fil-A, Compass Group USA, Health Care Without Harm, ISS Guckenheimer, Lamb Weston, R&DE Stanford Food Institute, Raley’s and Whole Foods Market.

Employee engagement

Pact members agree to collect and analyze data about their food waste, share best practices and pilot solutions. Together with the Pacific Coast Food Waste Commitment (PCFWC), a regional initiative that it builds upon, the pact regularly shares the results of studies and pilots. 

In November, for example, the pact reviewed evidence for engaging retail employees in food waste projects and recommended two types of solution: a reinforcing loop of training, empowering and recognizing staff achievement, alongside intermittent use of competitions and financial incentives. Evidence for the impact this can have was supplied in a case study released by the PCFWC the following month, which described how an employee program at a Fresh Del Monte plant in Portland, Oregon led to more than 250 pounds of saleable fruit being recovered every day.

Employee engagement is one area where Starbucks will add value to fellow members, said Tara Dalton, circular supply chain manager for food loss and waste at the WWF. “Starbucks is an industry leader in back-haul logistics as a solution for addressing food waste and food insecurity in the communities they operate;” she added. “This expertise is a value we want to bring to the wider Pact community.”

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