Rotisserie chickens in the trash: I worked in a supermarket and saw shocking food waste every day

[erronis]

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2026/jun/26/rotisserie-chickens-in-the-trash-i-worked-in-a-supermarket-and-saw-shocking-food-waste-every-day
Ann Larson

Stores over-stock their shelves, then toss out what they don't sell. Meanwhile, workers struggle to make ends meet

To most grocery shoppers, rotisserie chickens look like a mouth-watering and easy option for dinner. But whenever I pass by the rotisserie case in a supermarket, I see chicken carcasses piled up in the trash, their once glistening juices congealing into a slimy jelly.

It all started when I was working as a cashier in a chain supermarket. One day, I was chatting with a colleague about the behind-the-scenes secrets that shoppers didn't see. The deli employee said, "Last night we tossed out about sixteen birds." He explained that managers wanted the rotisserie chicken case to be full at all times because a full case looked appetizing, while a half empty one looked sad. Keeping the case full was an all-day affair. Workers arrived before dawn to season and roast dozens of birds. (One employee burned his arm while maneuvering chickens into the oven. He quit soon after.)

. . .

On the job, signs of employee hunger were hard to miss. One colleague told me that, at her previous job, she had marked down the price of some nearly expired ground beef that was about to be thrown in the trash. She had wanted to take the meat home to her family. But when managers found out what she did, they fired her. Another coworker admitted to spending her days off at the plasma clinic to earn money for groceries.

It's time that we make the connection between labor conditions in the retail industry and food waste in stores. Companies that don't pay a living wage can use the money they save to over-stock shelves. This appearance of abundance disguises the troubling reality that lush displays are purchased at the cost of workers' insecurity. If employers were forced to raise pay and improve conditions, they would have to rethink a business model that justifies food waste. I haven't worked in a store for years. But every time I shop for groceries, I can't help but think of the workers who seasoned, cooked, and stocked a supermarket delicacy knowing full well that it might end up in the trash.

[SuzyandPuffpuff]

1. Criminal

I worked food service for years and the amount of waste of food ... criminal. Inexcusable. Reprehensible. Senseless.

[exboyfil]

4. Look in the trash after school lunch

The waste there is extraordinary as well. Given the lunches I can understand (would love some of the lunches from foreign countries like Japan).

I have always been shocked at the cavalier way found is thrown out.

[popsdenver]

12. A PTA group of members

could come in every day, package left overs as meals, and make sure it got to the homeless shelters or to parents who need help feeding their kids......

[Boo1]

19. Likely illegal

What happens to school food is highly regulated since there are state and federal monies paying for it.

[bucolic_frolic]

2. Food banks would be a better option

Some retailers donate, some raise a little cash that way.

[Midnight Writer]

10. The supermarket near me takes the unsold "prepared food" to the homeless shelter.

[exboyfil]

3. At Kwik Star

They go into the cold case at a dramatic discount. I live on the fried chicken done that way.
1 8 pc chicken or 8 pc chicken tenders - $9
2 8 pc chicken or 8 pc chicken tenders -$16

Similar discounts on rotisserie chicken.

[orthoclad]

5. Gotta keep that profit margin up.

Capitalism at its best.

[BlueWaveNeverEnd]

6. Kick.

[lame54]

7. Some donate

[Karasu]

8. I think about this while grocery shopping all the time, unfortunately.

[31j20b3]

9. There are corporate, municipal, state and federal rules on food handling

In practice following those rules is the most important thing for the local food store

That means things get tossed. HUGE amounts of bread for example get tossed to meet best used by dates

Deli stuff gets tossed, especially if it was placed in unrefrigerated inserts in a customer accessible display

Meats get tossed

Blemished produce gets tossed, not because it's likely to make some one sick, but because shoppers are fussy and the longer a blemish works its life on the side of a tomato, the bigger it gets, same with many fruits, and also "wet" veggies

It's a shame to waste it. The stores hate the cost of what they call "shrinkage". But it's part of doing business.

Most businesses have no mechanism to "gift" food, because such a gift would come with LIABILITY

So, it's tossed. The farmers were paid, the produce vendors were paid, the clerks were paid. The store doesn't want to pay a lawsuit.

Around here, the stores will arrest people for "appearing to be dumpster diving".

I worked in a grocery store 6 or so blocks from the Milwaukee Zoo. The store could have moved blemished and near outdated food to animals in the zoo. But Zoo animals are worth many thousand$. Who wants the risk of liability?

Not One.

[erronis]

14. Great response - and a sad comment on the way our society works.

[dickthegrouch]

15. The twin horrors of deep pockets and liability are to blame

According to wikipedia:
About 30-40% of fresh food produced in the U.S. is wasted. This includes food lost at various stages from production to consumption.

When a store discards food, it is actually unlikely that that food would make anyone sick if it were 'collected' quickly by the community. However, the store's "deep pockets" make them prime targets for law suits by greedy attorneys and unfortunate collectors who, in a civil damages suit, only have to prove a preponderance of evidence, to get a payout.
There's no way to prove the store's discarded food caused the illness, but they get shaken down anyway.

Ambulance-chaser attorneys caused this problem, and they aren't about to give up their gravy train. Yet anotoher way in which the ethics classes for attorneys need to be heavily revamped.

If I had my way all law makers and attorneys would be required to do a year of engineering classes. Writing laws with ethical loopholes that entire States can fall into would result in instant loss of accreditation and Bar membership.

[Cirsium]

11. Disgusting

Somehow on the small family farm where I worked, handing fresh produce, we managed to never waste any food and no one in the county went hungry if we could help it. How come we could afford to do things right and these obscenely profitable corporations cannot?

[hunter]

13. Dumpsters are locked where I live.

Food in the trash attracts homeless people.

That's a picture of the U.S.A. most people don't want to think about.

[Raine]

16. Poor chickens, their lives taken just to end up in piles & piles garbage. 🤢🤮 nt

[manicdem]

17. Costco got it right

They'll use the expiring chicken in their other products like chicken salad, refrigeretead meats, tacos, etc.

Once I tried to buy a chicken salad and they ran out, not enough chicken leftovers.

[redwitch]

18. My grocery store donates everything they can to our food bank.

And they are part of a large chain, all their stores donate.

[harumph]

20. At my grocery store, unsold roasted chickens are marked down considerably

at the end of day. People come in pick them up for a 1/4 to 1/3 of the original price - take them home and eat them or strip the chicken for re-use. So, this may be some badly run stores, but not all.