When customers in the Danish supermarkets are looking for soups or ready meals, they will in future be greeted by the 'Look, smell, taste' label on a number of products from Danish Crown, which Too Good to Go stands behind, and an 'often good after' under the product's "best before" date. 

The background is that 53% of European consumers do not know the difference between the 'best before' and 'use by' dates. Therefore, far too much food ends up in garbage bags instead of stomach bags. The purpose of the new label is therefore to make it clearer that 'best before' is only an indicative date marking.

"According to the UN, 17 percent of all food ends up in the bin. It is expensive for the consumer, but also for society, because food waste accounts for up to 10 percent of the world's CO2 emissions. Therefore, we must do as much as possible to reduce food waste, and the agreement with Too Good to Go is a step in the right direction," says Mette Faerch, Senior Vice President, Global Categories at Danish Crown.

The collaboration with Too Good To Go cuts across Danish Crown's many brands. The label is already in place on Mou's veggie soup and organic tomato soup. The range is continuously expanded, and within the next few months it will include Steak Bernaise from Steff Houlberg, spareribs from Tulip and beef soup from Mou. Later, it will also find its way into the packages of hamburger buns from both Pålækker and Den Grønne Slagter.

Too Good To Go started as a food waste app in 2016, and has since gone on to win in a large number of countries around the world. In the first half of 2022, Too Good To Go was the seventh most downloaded food and drink app in the world and today has over 65 million registered users. The app connects consumers with businesses that have food in surplus so that it is eaten rather than smoked in the bin.

Since 2016, Too Good To Go has launched a wide range of information initiatives and collaborates with companies to raise awareness of food waste, directly on the companies products. This is the kind of collaboration Danish Crown and Too Good To Go have entered into.

"It has never been more important to fight food waste than it is right now, when food prices have risen by more than 15 percent, and many are finding it difficult to make their food budgets fit together. Because the fact is that many of the foods we throw away today could easily have been eaten. There is therefore a need for better guidance in consumption situations. And that is why it is both important and commendable that a major player like Danish Crown helps consumers on their way with guidance directly on the packaging," says Heidi Boye, country manager for Too Good To Go and Ph.D. in consumer behavior.

Danish Crown is putting the logo from Too Good To Go on seven products for the time being, but if the collaboration is a success, the plan is to extend it to more foods. Already now, Danish Crown adds "often good after" on all the products where the company can vouch for it in terms of quality, and this is justifiable for food safety.

"We will never write 'often good after' on the expiry dates on our fresh meat, but Danish Crown and our brands have many different products where it makes good sense to just smell and assess the quality of the food before throwing it in dustbin. It may seem like a small thing to put a label or a text on a product, but we believe that attention to food waste can make a difference, and it is on the packaging of our products that we are most directly involved contact with consumers," says Mette Faerch.