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In collaboration with the University of Surrey, Woking Borough Council has partnered with Too Good To Go and NearSt in a ‘love local’ initiative designed to safely encourage shoppers back to the High Street.
NearSt makes it easier for customers to support local independent businesses by providing a platform for traders who don’t already have an e-commerce presence to reach consumers with details of products and services they provide. The scheme works by automatically showing stock levels of products that are in shops within the borough to shoppers searching nearby on Google.
TooGoodToGo, helps reduce food waste and promote local eateries by helping diners get hold of surplus food, at a reduced price, which would otherwise be discarded. Through the app, users can order ‘Magic Bags’ of food from a particular category, such as pastries, sandwiches or salads, but exactly what is in the bag, for example, the type of sandwich, is a surprise. This allows stores to get the flexibility they need to make sure nothing gets thrown away.
As well as the environmental benefits, the app incentivises consumers to buy food from local shops, cafes and restaurants, and enables businesses to reach new customers and recover sunk costs.
Cllr Kevin Davis, Woking Borough Council’s Portfolio Holder for Environment and for Promoting the Local Economy, said: “Increasingly, we are becoming aware of the huge impact that our modern day, convenience lifestyle has on the planet, and the growing urgency to drastically reduce both our consumption of global resources and the quantity of waste we generate. Equally, over lockdown, we saw people rediscovering the joy of shopping locally, and these local traders still need us now, as much as ever, to keep them open and save jobs.
“We are excited to have introduced two ingenious online services into the Woking business community which are designed to do just this. I urge local businesses to start using NearSt to help your customers find you, and the products and services you provide, easily and quickly. And it is a no-brainer for me to encourage local eateries to start using TooGoodToGo, to help diners get hold of great food that would otherwise go to waste.
“By participating in these fantastic schemes, we can safely say that not only are we doing our bit to cut down on food waste and reduce our carbon footprint, we are also helping to strengthen our local economy by supporting independent businesses across the borough.”