{"id":238332,"date":"2026-01-17T16:49:07","date_gmt":"2026-01-17T16:49:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/238332\/"},"modified":"2026-01-17T16:49:07","modified_gmt":"2026-01-17T16:49:07","slug":"app-offers-an-easy-way-to-save-money-on-groceries-food-in-b-c","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/238332\/","title":{"rendered":"App offers an easy way to save money on groceries, food in B.C."},"content":{"rendered":"

Jenell Parsons, the founder of The Pie Hole, a dessert shop with locations in Vancouver, Langley, and Burnaby, used to give pies away to her staff when they\u2019d overbake and didn\u2019t sell out.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut there\u2019s only so much they can eat,\u201d she said, and they\u2019d sometimes have to compost the extras.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you have a shop where freshness is required, and you don\u2019t have a crystal ball, you\u2019re not clairvoyant, you don\u2019t know what the sales are going to be like for the day.\u201d<\/p>\n

Since 2021, she\u2019s worked with Too Good to Go, a marketplace app where people can log on and find bags of unsold food from nearby grocers and food businesses.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was kind of an interesting concept to eliminate the food waste,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

In the mornings, they package leftover baked or damaged goods that they can\u2019t sell at full price and post them on the app. Customers usually snap them up in less than 10 minutes.<\/p>\n

The bags are called \u201csurprise bags\u201d because consumers don\u2019t know what they are going to get, but they are at least half the cost of what they\u2019d be paying at full price.<\/p>\n

At The Pie Hole, it costs $6.99 for a minimum of $21 worth of product, and the premium bag costs $9.99 with at least $30 of product.<\/p>\n

A way to save money on groceries<\/p>\n

With the cost of living ever creeping up, a recent survey from TD suggests that 67 per cent of B.C. residents<\/a> are planning to cut back on spending this year. Fifty-five per cent are looking to cut back on spending on eating out or ordering food.<\/p>\n

Nicolas Dot, the PR manager for Too Good To Go, says that consumers can save a significant amount of money by using the app, suggesting that purchasing one surprise bag per week could lead to over $700 a year in savings.<\/p>\n

For example, one of its partners is Stongs Market, a grocery store on Dunbar Street, where you can buy a bag of groceries for $5.99 and get a value of $18.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou may get some packaged goods, but also some produce that is perhaps a bit bruised, but still enjoyable,\u201d he said. \u201cLabelled products [might be] at the best before date or perhaps past one or two days, but still, again, perfectly safe to eat.\u201d<\/p>\n

Since launching in B.C. in 2021, Too Good To Go now has over 2,000 participating food businesses in 50 cities across the province.<\/p>\n

Dot added that it also brings in some additional revenue for the businesses, because they can sell food that they\u2019d otherwise toss.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve been able to help BC food businesses to generate over $10 million of additional revenue through rescuing food,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Parsons said that while selling bags through Too Good To Go isn\u2019t necessarily profitable, it covers the cost of goods, so they aren\u2019t seeing a loss.<\/p>\n

It also helps them reach new people whom they otherwise wouldn\u2019t have. She said it has resulted in some repeat customers.<\/p>\n

Other ways to save on food<\/p>\n

The app helps food businesses cut back on their food waste, but Dot said it\u2019s an area where households can cut back on food costs as well, with people spending hundreds of dollars each year on food they throw out.<\/p>\n

Dot encourages people to trust their senses<\/a> (look, smell, and taste) on products past their best-before dates, since they are often still edible afterwards. He further suggests rearranging your fridge so as not to forget about things you will later have to toss out and to freeze leftovers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jenell Parsons, the founder of The Pie Hole, a dessert shop with locations in Vancouver, Langley, and Burnaby,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":238333,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[342,111,139,69,145],"class_list":{"0":"post-238332","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mobile","8":"tag-mobile","9":"tag-new-zealand","10":"tag-newzealand","11":"tag-nz","12":"tag-technology"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238332","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=238332"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238332\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/238333"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=238332"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=238332"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=238332"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}