A TED Talk Shout Out: Compass Group and Best Practices in Food Waste Reduction
As the world’s largest food service provider, Compass Group is pioneering innovative ways to tackle food waste. We are proud to have been featured in Dana Gunders’ recent TED Talk, where she addresses the staggering amount of food wasted globally- nearly one billion uneaten meals per day. Dana, a renowned expert in the field and President of leading food waste nonprofit ReFED, explains how waste squanders resources and contributes to greenhouse gas emissions.
Compass Group has partnered with ReFED for years, leveraging their insights to better understand the behaviors driving waste among both guests and associates. We actively participate in ReFED’s working groups, collaborating on solutions for food recovery, waste reduction, and consumer engagement.
In her talk, Dana highlights how companies like Compass Group are exploring different solutions, from tracking food waste to experimenting with smaller containers and offering varied portion sizes. These initiatives have helped reduce food waste by up to 50% in some of our largest sites. Our efforts align with the UN’s Sustainable Development Goal to halve food waste by 2030. By focusing on waste prevention and creative food waste reduction strategies, Compass is demonstrating that small operational changes can lead to significant impacts.
Beyond the everyday action happening in our operations, Compass Group is a proud member of the U.S. Food Waste Pact and Pacific Coast Food Waste Commitment, led by ReFED and World Wildlife Fund. Through these partnerships, we contribute to industry initiatives such as resource development, case studies, pilot programs, and data collection. These collaborations enable us to adopt best practices and bring cutting-edge solutions back to our teams and clients.
Dana’s TED Talk emphasizes that food waste is not a complex problem—it’s one we can tackle with the right systems, innovations, and awareness. We are proud of our leadership in this area and our work to set benchmarks for ourselves and others in the industry.
To watch Dana’s full TED Talk, click here.
About ReFED
ReFED is a multi-stakeholder nonprofit, powered by an influential network of the nation’s leading business, nonprofit, foundation and government leaders committed to reducing U.S. food waste. ReFED takes a data-driven approach to move the food system from acting on instinct to insights to solve our national food waste problem. They provide food waste solutions for our accounts as well as action guides to increase awareness.
About Compass Group North America
Compass Group is redefining the food and facility services landscape with innovation and passion through the lens of what’s next. Serving premier healthcare systems, respected educational institutions, world-renowned cultural centers, popular sporting and entertainment venues, and Fortune 500 organizations, Compass Group always finds a way to deliver excellence in nearly any vertical. Ranked No. 1 by industry peers on Fortune’s 2023 list of World’s Most Admired Companies, Compass has also earned a spot on Newsweek’s 2024 lists of America’s Greatest Workplaces for Diversity and America’s Greatest Workplaces for Women and is among the Top 50 Companies Changing the World according to Fortune. Learn more about the Compass experience at www.compass-usa.com.