Southern Co-op has moved substantially closer to hitting its food waste reduction targets, boosted by its adoption of AI-powered technology.

The retailer has teamed up with Retail Insight to use its data-driven food waste reduction solution, WasteInsight. In particular the convenience chain has employed a dynamic markdown feature to reduce waste. 

The technology analyses a range of data points, from product type to seasonality, to help stores choose the best time and price to reduce items – cutting waste and boosting sales.

The convenience giant has revealed this saved 3.1m meals from being wasted last year, an increase of 16% year-on-year.

Alongside reduced wastage, the solution has also had a significant impact on emissions reductions, with Co-op claiming that it has prevented 3,083 tonnes of food from entering landfill – the same weight as 257 double-decker buses.

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This represents a rise of 426 tonnes compared to the previous year. The initiative also prevented the emission of 8,323 tonnes of Co2e.

“The markdown process is far more transparent and proactive than it was before.  Retail Insight’s solution enables us to steer our markdown strategy toward a more optimised way of working, with clear goals and improved visibility into outcomes,” said Southern Co-op chief operations officer of food retail Simon Eastwood.

“In-store teams have found it easy and we now have much better visibility of how our store teams are complying with the markdown values and timings, which we did not previously have.” 

Retail insight VP for customer success EMEA, Kieran O’Brien, added: “It’s great to see the strides that Southern Co-op is creating on its path to a waste-free future. 

“With optimised markdowns, Southern Co-op not only reduces food wastage, stopping perfectly good food entering landfill, but it’s also able to sell more while delivering value to its customers.”