HomeSocial Impact HeroesReducing Food Waste: Jon Roesser Of Weavers Way On How They Are...

Reducing Food Waste: Jon Roesser Of Weavers Way On How They Are Helping To Eliminate Food Waste

An Interview With Martita Mestey

Love what you do. Luckily, I love what I do because the job I’m in is incredibly demanding and requires a level of commitment nobody would be able to deliver if they didn’t.

It has been estimated that each year, more than 100 billion pounds of food is wasted in the United States. That equates to more than $160 billion worth of food thrown away each year. At the same time, in many parts of the United States, there is a crisis caused by people having limited access to healthy & affordable food options. The waste of food is not only a waste of money and bad for the environment, but it is also making vulnerable populations even more vulnerable.

Authority Magazine started a new series called “How Restaurants, Grocery Stores, Supermarkets, Hospitality Companies and Food Companies Are Helping To Eliminate Food Waste.” In this interview series, we are talking to leaders and principals of Restaurants, Grocery Stores, Supermarkets, Hospitality Companies, Food Companies, and any business or nonprofit that is helping to eliminate food waste, about the initiatives they are taking to eliminate or reduce food waste.

As a part of this series, I had the pleasure of interviewing Jon Roesser.

Jon Roesser is one of the leading figures in the Philadelphia cooperative economy. He has been the General Manager of Weavers Way Cooperative Association since May, 2015. As General Manager of Weavers Way, Jon is committed to engaging in commerce in a way that is more fair, equitable, and ultimately more sustainable, and to reestablishing local control over the Philadelphia region’s economy.

Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series! Before we dive in, our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you tell us a story about what brought you to this specific career path?

The crushing knowledge that if we keep going on the same destructive path on this spinning blue marble, the marble will one day revolt.

Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you began at your company or organization?

The past year and a half have been unpredictably interesting from the standpoint that we had, and continue, to pivot to keep our employees and customers safe. My job also gives me invaluable supply chain insight so I know well before it hits the fan how it’s going to hit, when it will most probably hit, what kind of fan it will be, and what will be the impact of that hit.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

I don’t know if I can say it’s funny, but I learned from this. At one point I hired someone at a senior level who I knew should not have been hired but I did anyways because I needed to fill the job. Despite the misgivings, I decided it would have been better than the alternative which is to continue the search, so I took the risk. I now know to not make that colossal mistake again and would rather wait it out for the right fit.

How do you define “Leadership”? Can you explain what you mean or give an example?

It goes well beyond Webster’s definition of the action of leading a group. We are all leaders all the time at any given moment, some better than others. Personally, I think good leadership maximizes relationships for the greatest output of efficiency. The tools needed to define good leadership include inspiration, motivation, empathy, compassion, respect, and above all else humility. A great example of good leadership depends first on how success is defined.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

“When it’s better for everyone, it’s better for everyone” — Eleanor Roosevelt. It’s one of the tenets of our Co-op and we work every single day towards creating ways to make it better for everyone such as our reusable container program, our Food for All program where our members help other members, our community fridges, the fact we use local, sustainable, and organic whenever we can.

OK, thank you for all of that. Let’s now shift to the main focus of our interview. Let’s begin with a basic definition of terms so that all of us are on the same page. What exactly are we talking about when we refer to food waste?

Food waste is something as a grocery store we address in multiple ways. First, what’s at expiration goes to prepared food to see if it would or could be of use to our recipes. Or, the item gets deeply discounted. If neither option works, we donate the food. On average, we donate approximately $50-$75 daily. Multiply that figure by every Co-op doing what we do in every state in every city across the country and that number is very significant. However, a lot can still be done because the number of individuals struggling with food insecurity is staggeringly sobering.

Can you help articulate a few of the main causes of food waste?

Climate change. Inefficiency. Covid. Food waste is produced along every touchpoint of our supply chain. Cherries are dying on their trees because there is a lack of water in the west. Those cherries can’t be transported via trucks because warehousing isn’t available due to a lack of labor wanting to work in those warehouses thanks to COVID. If those cherries happen to make it to an east coast store, they may or may not look perfect and rot in their bags on a shelf only to be tossed. If they DO make it onto a plate via Chef or home cook, there’s a good chance the dish isn’t entirely eaten, and a certain percentage is tossed in that regard.

What are a few of the obstacles that companies and organizations face when it comes to distributing extra or excess food? What can be done to overcome those barriers?

The single biggest obstacle would be not having a strong and developed partnership with a food pantry that will take something at a moment’s notice. If those relationships are cultivated early on and kept active, it makes the process far simpler, easier, and more efficient for both parties. If you have a steady stream of excess food, you need to know you can rely on that organization, but that organization also knows they need to be able to rely on you. There were many times when we sent a food that we could have probably sold ourselves but did not in order to maintain our strong relationship with our local food bank.

Can you describe a few of the ways that you or your organization are helping to reduce food waste?

Containers and packages account for 23 percent of landfill waste. Our bulk program directly tackles that. We also use biodegradable, earth-friendly packaging for our cheese as opposed to petroleum-based plastic. Our recyclable soup glass container program eliminates the need for single-use plastic soup containers. We also work with local vendors who are big on zero food waste. For example, one of the vendors we are working with through our Vendor Diversity Program, which supports BIPOC-owned startups, converts avocado seeds into a healthy juice. These seeds are often wasted but are in fact healthy and make a delicious tea.

Are there three things the community/society/politicians can do to help address the root of this problem?

Society needs to universally support the imperfections nature creates. If an apple is bruised, if a carrot isn’t perfectly shaved down into a baby carrot for you, deal with it and just eat it. Communities need to band together and support each other through community fridge programs, anonymous community food donations, better composting, planning, and collection for community gardens. Politicians? They should do the unthinkable and put people and the planet over profit as we do. We are all stewards of the planet no matter what our political affiliation and as such, must act in a responsible way.

What are your “5 things I wish someone told me when I first started” and why. Please share a story or example for each.

  1. Love what you do. Luckily, I love what I do because the job I’m in is incredibly demanding and requires a level of commitment nobody would be able to deliver if they didn’t.
  2. Communicating is one of the most important skills a person can have. I deal with managing a large portion of my day, but I also deal with employees and customers. Each group needs to be communicated differently, but they all need to be communicated clearly.
  3. Strike a balance. It’s a lesson learned for sure. Working in versus on the business is something I juggle and struggle with every day and I try to make a balance and space for both at all times.
  4. Be able to manage criticism. My job is high profile in that I engage with everyone and sometimes people for whatever reason can be just blatantly mean. Some individuals have a knack for letting things roll off of their backs. I am not one of those people, but I think that if I were given that advice early on, it may be easier.
  5. Carve out personal time whenever, wherever you can because the job never ever ends. Take the vacation even if it’s a coffee break on a Tuesday afternoon or a ball game on Friday.

Are there other leaders or organizations who have done good work to address food waste? Can you tell us what they have done? What specifically impresses you about their work? Perhaps we can reach out to them to include them in this series.

I admire the job that larger, conventional grocery store chains have also done with food waste. Giant and Philabundance is a great example. The cost is just way too high to throw away. And, there are intangible benefits to the business to consider. Although the agenda for a for-profit business versus our model of “triple bottom line” may be different, the end results are still the same: helping people and the planet. When we do align by participating in reducing food waste and feeding the hungry, they get my utmost admiration.

You are a person of enormous influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂

This is difficult for me to answer, but the movement would be a universal and global undertaking to ban single-use plastics. As with food waste, small changes in our behavior could have widespread impacts. The amount of plastic waste is shocking and dangerous for our health and the planet. If everyone just shifted slightly towards shunning plastic forks given out at every Starbucks or accepting a slight increase in price for a recycled glass jar as opposed to a plastic soup container; this planet would improve. After all, this is where my favorite quote comes into play: when it’s better for everyone.

Is there a person in the world, or in the US with whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch, and why? He or she might just see this, especially if we tag them. 🙂

One of my biggest heroes is dead but I would have absolutely loved to have breakfast with Dwight D. Eisenhower because he was such a brilliant peacemaker. He had the ability to get people who disagreed to find a common ground. He lacked vanity and humility. Lastly, he had to make really hard decisions he knew would lead to the death of many people, but he nonetheless made them and wasn’t paralyzed by it. He was a great, great man.

How can our readers further follow your work online?

Through our website, our digital newsletter, our social and opportunities like this that will hopefully be read and acted upon.

This was very meaningful, thank you so much, and we wish you only continued success.


Reducing Food Waste: Jon Roesser Of Weavers Way On How They Are Helping To Eliminate Food Waste was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.