In our previous post about expiration labels, we surveyed the history of open dating, its lack of standardization, and the subsequent consumer confusion about food safety that creates unnecessary food waste. In this post, we follow up with a discussion of the current (and inadequate) regulations for expiration dating, recommendations for change by the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), current industry...

Written by SmartSense | January 23, 2020 | Food Safety

Food retailers are gatekeepers to the U.S. food system. They influence what products travel from farms to shelves, and help determine consumer shopping trends. For these reasons especially, grocers are increasingly under pressure to prevent grocery food waste. For instance, the Center for Biological Diversity (CBD) recently took the industry by surprise, grading the country’s top 10 largest supermarkets on their...

Written by SmartSense | January 15, 2020 | Food Safety, Supply Chain

There’s a new convenience store in town. It doesn’t merely stock the old standbys, such as soda, energy drinks, snacks, and candy. No, this “multi-format” c-store is a hybrid that also offers fine wine and artisan beer, gourmet coffee, hot prepared foods, sandwich and salad bars, and upscale vending machines – even gas pumps in the parking lot. Not to mention that customers may also order online in advance or...

Written by SmartSense | January 9, 2020 | Food Safety

In a previous post, we surveyed Best Practices for Food Recall Response & Prevention. As a follow up, in this post we take a deeper dive into the three recall classes: what distinguishes them from each other, illustrated by concrete examples. Then, after a brief “report card” on how well the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has been handling the most urgent recalls (Class I), we’ll suggest a few ways companies can...

Written by SmartSense | January 2, 2020 | Food Safety

When we typically think food safety, what comes to mind is food in transit to stores, then available for purchase, and eventually makes it on to our kitchen tables. However, there's another category of food safety: food served by airlines during air travel.

Written by SmartSense | December 24, 2019 | Food Safety

Grocery stores offer a wide variety of foods, including many perishables that require tight temperature controls. Fridges, freezers, reach-ins, and bunkers that hold these sensitive foods must be checked throughout the day, taking time away from team members from ensuring good experience for their customers. Manual temperature checks, typically done with pen and paper, are error-prone, easily forgotten, increase...

Written by SmartSense | December 10, 2019 | Food Safety, HACCP