What if solving hunger isn’t about growing more food—but wasting less of it? That question is at the heart of social entrepreneur Jasmine Crowe-Houston’s mission, and her company, Goodr, may be one of the most innovative answers to America’s food insecurity crisis yet.
In a featured interview on TED Explores: Food the Future, host and journalist Manoush Zomorodi (@manoushz) dives into Crowe-Houston’s tech-powered movement to reroute surplus food from businesses directly to people in need—proving that solving hunger can be good for people, the planet, and even profit margins.
“Hunger is not an issue of scarcity. It’s a logistics problem,” Crowe-Houston explains. “In the U.S. particularly, we spend $218 billion on food we never eat.”
Goodr, the company she founded, uses a real-time tracking platform to redirect uneaten but still viable food from grocery stores, restaurants, and corporate cafeterias to food kitchens, schools, and churches. The mission: eliminate food waste while combating food insecurity across the nation.
Goodr’s Three-Tiered System for Reducing Waste
Crowe-Houston’s model sorts surplus food into three categories:
- Still good for people: Unexpired and safe-to-eat items are sent to community organizations.
- Not for people, still not spoiled: Items that aren’t fit for human consumption are delivered to farms to feed animals.
- Rotten or unusable: These are composted and turned into nutrient-rich soil.
It’s a circular economy rooted in smart logistics, sustainability, and corporate social responsibility.
“Companies already pay for waste management,” Crowe-Houston points out. “They might as well pay to have their excess food donated—and get a tax deduction while they’re at it.”
A Tech-Driven Solution to a National Problem
Goodr’s platform gives real-time data and accountability to partner businesses while providing a transparent food redistribution process. It helps companies reduce waste costs, lower carbon emissions, and most importantly, get food into the hands of those who need it most.
Crowe-Houston’s work has already scaled nationwide and has garnered attention from the business, nonprofit, and tech sectors alike.
Why It Matters
The United States wastes nearly 40% of its food supply, even as more than 34 million people—including 9 million children—struggle with hunger. Crowe-Houston’s work confronts this contradiction head-on with an elegant solution that challenges how we think about waste, hunger, and impact.
“The goal is to turn food waste into a win-win-win,” she says—and Goodr is doing just that.
