In the UK alone, over three million tonnes of fruit and veg is wasted before it has even left the farm, meaning all the energy, water and time that went into growing it was also a waste. On a mission to tackle this global problem and foster conscious consumerism, husband and wife team Emilie Vanpoperinghe and Deepak Ravindran founded Oddbox in 2016. The story began in Portugal, at a food market. The fruit and veg tasted delicious but looked wonky and it got the pair thinking about why we only see the same perfectly shaped food on our supermarket shelves and what happened to all that produce that didn’t qualify.
Returning to the UK, they researched and discovered that 20-40% of produce in the UK is wasted before it even leaves the farms. Every week, growers are left with fresh produce they can’t sell to supermarkets. So they talked to producers and came up with the idea for Oddbox - Farm-fresh, delicious ‘odd’ & surplus fruit & veg delivered straight to customer doors.
Oddbox’s weekly boxes are filled with imperfect fruits and vegetables that have been rescued from farms and would otherwise have been wasted. The company pays farmers a fair price and donates up to 10 per cent to tackle food poverty by partnering with charities like City Harvest.
Browsing the home box delivery options, the options range in size and content.
If you choose the mixed Fruit & Veg Box for example you can rescue up to 9 varieties of veg & 4 varieties of fruit, (Small: £12.99, Medium: £15.99, Large: £19.99).
Customers can also view the amount of food waste, CO2 emissions and water they have helped to save.
As a Certified B Corporation (B-Corp), Oddbox are part of the growing group of companies leading the way to make business a force for good. In addition, they use recyclable boxes and never add unnecessary packaging in. They also collect your old box to be recycled, giving it a new life.
The business continues to build a strong brand, optimise operations and broaden its delivery area, but fundamentally their mission is to shift food standards and eventually normalise wonky produce.
The website is keep updated with what they rescue each week. Check your postcode online and the list of upcoming cities planned for launch. And between box deliveries, the Oddbox blog features useful recipes and community news.
By Anna Bance
November 2020
Fruit and veg that taste delicious but look wonky: this is the premise behind Oddbox's weekly deliveries using produce that would otherwise have been wasted.
By
Anna Bance
·
Published November 2020
Anna is the co-founder of Girls Meets Dress and a contributing editor to The Guide. She expertly guides us round the most covetable online fashion.