As the supply chain and sustainability manager for Just Salad, Alexandra Harden oversees the fast-casual chain’s efforts to reduce waste from food and packaging, among other initiatives.
But as she explained to Nation’s Restaurant News editor-in-chief Sam Oches during a talk at the 2024 National Restaurant Association Show, the brand also finds ways to generate revenue from its sustainability programs and leverage both the top and bottom lines of the P&L to maximize profitability. Much of that starts with Just Salad’s iconic blue salad bowl, which Harden says is pioneering what should be the next big trend to come from the foodservice industry: reusability.
Since 2006, the reusable bowl has acted like a customer loyalty program, offering value to the consumer in the form of a free salad topping when they use the bowl to eliminate package waste. A partnership with Too Good to Go has also saved 125,000 meals from going to landfills, while netting Just Salad half a million dollars in incremental revenue.
This is a special episode of Extra Serving, recorded at the National Restaurant Association Show and sponsored by Davo.
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