Fresh produce delivery service Good & Fugly is bringing its fight against food waste to Newcastle.
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Boxes of imperfect - but still seasonal and fresh - fruit and vegetables are being delivered to homes and workplaces across the city and surrounding suburbs.
Good & Fugly co-founder Richard Tourino says his customers pay up to 30 per cent less than people ordering fruit and vegetables for delivery from supermarkets and, at the same time, are doing the planet a favour.
"Up to 45 per cent of produce doesn't leave Australian farms for the markets because it's not pretty enough, basically," he explained.
"Supermarkets and many other sellers have a set of standards - for example, a tomato has to be perfectly round and not have any scars on it - but that's not how a lot of produce comes out of the ground or from a tree.
"We work direct with farmers, and pay them a fair price to get their produce, put it in seasonal boxes and deliver it to people's front doors.
"Our produce is fresh, never bruised, and by selling it we're stopping it from being ploughed back into the ground or, even worse, going back into landfill."
He cites as another example the refusal of supermarkets to buy a single banana, preferring bunches.
"That means a lot of single bananas just get thrown out, but at the supermarkets customers will pull a single banana from the bunch anyway, it's crazy. The price of fruit and vegetables is skyrocketing, and still, major supermarkets are rejecting produce based on looks alone."
Good & Fugly launched in Sydney in 2020 to help fight Australia's food waste epidemic by preventing imperfect produce deemed cosmetically unsuitable for supermarkets from going to waste.
Each box delivered includes a handy recipe card.
As part of the Newcastle launch, Good & Fugly will also be looking to connect with local farmers who have cosmetically challenged produce or surplus stock they need cleared. Good & Fugly works directly with farmers to give them a fair price for produce that would otherwise be thrown away.
Interested farmers and growers are invited to contact Good & Fugly's Farmer's Hotline on 13-000-FUGLY.
"About a year ago a farmer found us online and called me up; he was desperate," Tourino said.
"He had three orchards of peaches that had been hit by hail, and they were perfectly fine except they were scarred. The bruise didn't go into the flesh but he couldn't sell them to the supermarkets, they rejected them.
"So we took as many peaches as we possibly could and passed them on to our customers, and the feedback we've got is that they were delicious.
"We're on the hunt for as many growers as we can get. At the moment produce coming to Newcastle will come via our Sydney distribution centre first, but our model is, once we've built up a volume of customers in a city, we'll set up a warehouse there to reduce food miles, and that's our plan for Newcastle."
Good & Fugly is taking orders from Newcastle residents at goodandfugly.com.au.
