Happy Early Birthday!

Do you like surprises? Do you like discounts? That sounds to me like a celebration!

Who wouldn't want this delicious giant (hand for scale) snicker doodle for 67% off?

There's an app for that! Too Good To Go knows that restaurants, bakeries, and grocery stores have leftover items at the end of the day that they don't want to sell as "day old" or nearing their best by date. For most stores, this means those food items go into the trash.

So why not help those businesses recoup some of those losses, prevent that food waste, and reward us customers for participating with a 50%+ discount? This isn't a foreign concept - apparel stores do sales at the end of a season, right?

The idea: businesses list their leftovers in "surprise bags" at the end of the day. You get a fun surprise and enjoy a steep discount for taking the risk of not knowing exactly what you're going to get (check them out if you have few dietary restrictions and love adventure!). I used to get surprise bags at my favorite olive oil store, and love that this idea is expanding to other food businesses. 

Here's a peek at the app experience (and click the link above to download the app yourself, or visit your smartphone's app store):

 

Here you can see I'm viewing a local cafe whose surprise bag is valued at $12 and being sold for $4 (a 67%) discount. It also shows a pickup window, usually an hour or so before closing the same day, or reserve ahead for the next day. I know this cafe, and am expecting pastries in the bag, although some of the stores describe the contents a bit. For example, a grocery store shares that it will include prepared salads from their deli.

 

You simply click the reserve button, and pre-pay. When you arrive for pick up, you just show the app and click a couple buttons to acknowledge the pickup. 

I was super pleased with the contents of my surprise bag: 4 large pastries, including the snicker doodle at the beginning of this post and...

this gorgeous berry fritter,

and this savory bacon cheese scone,

and this still-super-moist crumble coffee cake.

Hungry yet? Go sign up for a surprise bag. :) I definitely think I got over $12 of value, and was thrilled to eat my $1 scone for lunch yesterday, and $1 coffee cake for breakfast today.

As you purchase from Too Good to Go, you can feel good as they send you confirmation emails that let you know about your positive impact:

Thank you for saving your first Surprise Bag. For each one rescued, you save 5.5lbs of CO2e - the same amount that would be emitted if a lightbulb was left on for 29 days. 

Today there are 16 deals within 5 miles of me (outside Seattle) and 142 deals within 15 miles of me (includes downtown Seattle and Bellevue). I can't wait for more businesses to get on board!