The Food Recovery Network is in its third year of recovering leftovers from Super Bowl events and donating them to needy organizations.
Known for its intense football games, hilarious commercials, and entertaining halftime shows, the Super Bowl is among the world’s most-watched single sporting events. The Super Bowl is also known for the food spectators munch on, whether at home or live in the stadiums. The Super Bowl 2023, hosted at the State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Arizona, had around 68 thousand fans in the stands. That makes for a lot of nachos and hot dogs. Over 140 000 pounds of food and beverages are prepared for the Super Bowl game. But where there is a lot of food, there is usually a lot of waste. Fortunately, there was a plan to collect any leftovers from the game held on February 12.
The Food Recovery Network (FRN) is the largest led student movement fighting food waste and working to end hunger in the United States. Since they were established in 2011, the organization has recovered and donated millions of pounds of food and meals. Over 2.1 million pounds of food have been recovered, and over 10.1 million meals have been donated. The Food Recovery Network partners with companies across the U.S. to recover food from conferences and events and provide third-party verification for food businesses donating their surplus food to hunger-fighting partners.
The FRN organized its first food collection drive following the Super Bowl game in southern Florida in 2020. The project started due to the increasing levels of food insecurity across the country but grew significantly due to the Covid-19 pandemic. In 2022, FRN collected almost 2000 pounds of food from the 2022 Player’s Tailgate party hosted by Guy Fieri held at California’s SoFi stadium. The FRN were able to recover a lot of high-end seafood as well as raw ingredients such as milk and eggs.
The organization planned to collect a lot of leftover food from the 2023 “Players Tailgate” event hosted by Food Network chef Bobby Flay. The event was ticketed as an all-you-can-drink-and-eat party with gourmet dished prepared by celebrity chefs. Once the tailgate ends and the football game begins, the FRN would have about 2 hours to pack the food into their refrigerated truck and deliver it to the Pheonix Rescue Mission, a nonprofit supporting people facing hunger, homelessness, addiction and trauma.
The Food Recovery Network hasn’t posted the results from the Super Bowl event, but with 68 thousand of fans, we can only imagine how much leftovers were recovered and donated. The team is already organizing their plan to rescue the leftover food from the 2024 Super Bowl game, which will be held in Las Vegas.
The Super Bowl is a huge event that attracts so many spectators and, in turn, can accumulate a lot of waste. The efforts the FRN are making to reduce waste and donate it to people in need are admirable. It should inspire other organizations to implement it at events with large crowds and lots of food.
