Tesco creates TV advert to showcase its charity food scheme
Howard Lake | 14 June 2017 | News
A Tesco advert debuts on TV today that features its scheme to redistribute surplus food to charities, as part of the supermarket’s national ‘Food Love Stories’ campaign.
The advert showcases Community Food Connection, the retailer’s surplus food redistribution initiative, which is operated in partnership with food redistribution charity FareShare. The scheme enables Tesco stores to donate unsold food to feed people in need through a technology platform developed by Irish social enterprise, FoodCloud.
It was filmed at Bo’ness Academy, one of 5,000 charities that benefit from the scheme across the UK. Each week the Academy receives surplus food from the Tesco Bo’ness store, and turns it into wholesome homemade snacks and cakes for their on-site community café.
As a result school children at the Academy learn new cooking skills, and the school gets to give back to the local community. Many of the visitors to the café each week are retired, and it gives them the opportunity to socialise and enjoy good food and company.
Nothing Wasted Banana Bread
FareShare Chief Executive Lindsay Boswell, said: “It’s fantastic that Tesco’s new ‘Food Love Stories’ advert will go out on primetime national TV and help raise the profile of surplus food. There’s no reason at all for good quality, in date food to be thrown away when it could go to a charity who needs it, and the fantastic community café at Bo’ness shows just what a difference that food can make.”
10 million meals
The advert is aired as the Community Food Connection programme reaches a milestone of 10 million meals of surplus food donated to local charities and community groups right across the UK.
The scheme is currently live in over 1,700 stores, and will be rolled out to all Tesco stores by the end of this year.
Food Love Stories
The advert is the latest in Tesco’s Food Love Stories campaign, which introduces a new “food love story” each month to demonstrate the special role food plays in people’s lives.
The advert will air on TV from tonight, with spots on Emmerdale, Gogglesprogs, Blacklist and The Voice Kids.
It features an original recipe from the charity; ‘Bo’ness Academy Nothing Wasted Banana Bread’. The recipe was developed by the school, following their experiences cooking with surplus food from Tesco.
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- Tesco Community Food Connection scheme reaches 5m meals milestone (January 2017)
- Tesco donates food to mosques to mark Ramadan (June 2016)
- Tesco expands trial of donating unsold food to UK charities (June 2015)
About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale.
He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.