This App Could Help You Save Money on Your Favorite Eats While Avoiding Food Waste

Most of us are familiar with the concept of wasted food. We go a little overboard buying produce at Costco and end up dumping a portion of our haul. Or, we have high hopes for our Crockpot creations only to end up tossing some leftovers at the end of the week.

Food waste happens to the best of us, and you don't necessarily have to beat yourself up every time you throw a small amount of uneaten or expired food in the trash. But on a national level, food waste is a big problem.

Americans waste an astounding 2.8 billion tons of food annually, while 828 million people go hungry every day. Meanwhile, food waste is costing the U.S. economy $1.2 trillion per year.

It's for this reason that it's best to do what you can to eliminate food waste. And one app is making it easier for consumers and restaurants alike to put an end to that practice.

When unused food finds a home

It's common for restaurants to end up with excess food at the end of a given day. It's also common for consumers to steer clear of restaurants when money is tight and stick to lower-cost groceries instead. Now, an app called Too Good to Go is working to solve the problem of food waste by connecting consumers to local eateries with excess product on their hands.

The way it works is simple. You download the app and then get to browse by ZIP code to see which restaurants in your area participate in the program. Those restaurants will then list their deals daily based on the amount of product they anticipate having left over.

For example, you might see your local pizzeria advertise a large cheese pizza for 50% off its usual price of $15.99 at some point during the day. You may not be able to swing $15.99 for a pizza, even if that's the going rate. But paying around $8 may be doable. So in this case, you'd simply sign up for that offer and pick up your discounted pizza at the end of the day.

Should you use Too Good To Go?

There are few nuances you should keep in mind before you get too excited about Too Good To Go. First, the whole point of the app is to allow businesses to unload excess food. As such, you'll generally be looking at picking up your order around the time a given restaurant is closing. So in the case of our pizzeria offering 50% off, your pizza may not be available to you until 9:00 p.m. or 9:30 p.m., which may be well past when you'd normally serve dinner. 

Similarly, in some cases, you won't know exactly what leftover food you're getting. A bagel store or bakery that closes at 3:00 p.m. daily might offer what it calls its "leftover assortment" for a 2:45 p.m. pickup. You'll be told what the price is and, generally, how many items you're getting. But you might end up with 12 blueberry bagels for 50% off, rather than an assortment of flavors that are more your speed. 

Plus, there may be some days when your go-to eateries on the app don't have leftover inventory to sell. So it's not necessarily a great idea to count on the app for lunch or dinner. Rather, you need to be flexible. 

But if you're willing to take a chance on what you're getting and pick up your food at odd hours, you might end up scoring major discounts on restaurant eats. And that way, you can not only save yourself time in the kitchen, but also become part of the solution to the problem of food waste.