Food waste among restaurants, especially chain restaurants, is a hot topic among many on TikTok. From Chick-Fil-A disposing of superfluous nuggets, to waste at Whole Foods, to this latest incident of many donuts at Dunkin’, people online have a lot of feelings about it.
A video shared to TikTok showing a store employee throwing away many of the day’s unsold donuts has garnered 584,600 views on the platform.
“I hate closing here,” a text overlay on the video reads. “Throwing over 100 donuts away every night or more.”
The food waste of the donuts, poster @aidenshaw142 wrote in a text overlay, was bothersome because they knew there were people out there who might appreciate the donuts but not be able to afford them.
“Not even two years ago I was scraping change to buy a coffee and a donut,” another text overlay reads.
“Sucks not being able to give this many donuts away for free because of ‘cooperative,’” they wrote. “So sad watching this homeless couple dumpster dive for donuts that’s soaking in coffee, coffee grounds and milk! But they would choose to watch them dive then to hand them free donuts!”
The video received many comments urging the Dunkin’ employee to give away the donuts at the end of the day.
“Please give them out to (people) who are hungry I hate to see food go to waste especially when there are people who haven’t eaten in days,” one commenter wrote.
Just as many commenters are claiming that businesses can’t donate prepared food because of liability issues.
“They can be sued if they give them away and somebody gets sick and stuff like that,” one commenter wrote.
Under the Bill Emerson Good Samaritan Food Donation Act, businesses can donate prepared food to nonprofits that help get this surplus of food to people who need it. The act was signed into law by former President Bill Clinton in 1996.
The Daily Dot has reached out to @aidenshaw142 via TikTok DM, and to Dunkin’ directly regarding its food waste policy.
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