Kill The Meal Kit Delivery Companies

Before they kill the planet

Jen and I, along with ~10 other volunteers, spent two hours unpacking 2 pallets worth of prepackaged meals, donated by Hello Fresh. These companies should be illegal.

Hello Fresh donated the pallets of food to a local food recovery organization because they would’ve otherwise thrown them into the garbage. Ending up in landfills to rot and pollute the ozone.

Not only is the amount of food that these companies waste beyond comprehension, the amount of packaging that they require is disgusting. Brown paper bags stuffed with “meal kits,” containing individually wrapped spices, sauces, cheese, fruit, vegetables, and bread.

Picture this. Half a bell pepper wrapped in a plastic bag. One serving of cilantro pesto sauce in a to go style plastic package. Two slices of bread, wrapped in plastic. One serving of feta cheese, in a plastic bag. On and on and on.

Even if these two pallets actually went to paying customers, instead of being shipped to the landfill (before being intercepted for food recovery), it should still ring the alarm. The amount of plastic being used will make you sick

These companies have no morals. They have no awareness or respect for the environment and have no shame when it comes to trying to make a profit.

I’m sick of companies like these. And I’m sick of the fact that they are even allowed to exist. The federal government passed a huge spending bill last year, made up in large part of spending on “renewable energy.” Yet companies like Hello Fresh that devastate the earth with their incompetent business models are allowed to exist.

Jen and I have been tying to find a place to compost our food scraps and yard waste for the last month. I finally found a small company that accepts drop offs or does pickups for a small monthly fee (if you’re in or around Denver check out: Compost Colorado). Denver has apparently been working on rolling out a compost program for a couple of years now. We live 20 minutes from downtown and our region still hasn’t made the rollout.

If governments actually cared, if they were actually competent, the very least they would do is mandate a nation wide composting program in all municipalities. But they don’t. So, everyday people that actually do care fight an uphill battle. Trying to negate the ill effects of a shitty and incompetent government that allows companies to shit all over our country with zero repercussions. It’s a maddening situation.

Waste

Everyone talks about the effects of too much waste, then they go and waste. Take out containers. Take out drinks. Ziplock bags. Aluminum foil. Paper towels. Whatever it is. Watch someone for a while and you’ll find how much they waste.

I hate being wasteful. It comes off as being frugal, or cheap. But I’m not the latter. I just don’t like to waste. Whether that’s floss or money, I just don’t see the point.

So when I see people waste around me it twists my insides because I can picture that plastic cup or styrofoam container sitting in a pile of garbage rotting, just poisoning our land and water. And it kills me.

So I try not to be wasteful. I try to be very conscious of it. And frugal. But I know it’s such an up hill battle in the quick, easy, efficient world we live in where nothing is meant to last. Sadly, including the planet.