Bye Bye Food Waste: OLIO Has Raised A $43 MILLION Series B.

OLIO (the app that’s on a mission to beat the global food waste crisis), – has raised a $43 MILLION Series B round. OLIO already has 5 million users globally.

OLIO was Founded in London in 2015 by Tessa Clarke, and Saasha Celestial-One. The app now operates in 50 different countries, worldwide. Their recent Series B investment of $43 MILLION will help OLIO to fund their global expansion, with a strong focus on Latin American, Northern European, and Asian markets.

The goal? To target one billion OLIO users by 2030.

The funds will be used to rapidly accelerate the roll-out of OLIO’s ‘Food Waste Heroes’ programme in the UK, and in other international markets. OLIO has over 30,000 Food Waste Heroes, who are all trained members of the community: they collect and redistribute unsold, or unserved food from businesses such as Pret A Manger, Compass Catering, Costa Coffee, and Elior.

OLIO’s ‘Food Waste Hero Programme,’ is a hyper-local redistribution network, which enables businesses to achieve zero edible food waste, supporting their sustainability objectives, and the race to ‘Net Zero.’

The food waste issue is a big one: it sits at around $1.3trillion of food waste created globally each year. OLIO enables users to give away unwanted food, and other household items to neighbours, for free, – with the aim of reducing waste in the home, whilst helping people to consume more locally (and sustainably, of course).

OLIO is the brainchild of Clarke, who struggled to find anyone to take the unwanted food from her fridge when she was moving house. Since its launch, the app has enabled over 25 million portions of food, and three million non-food items to be saved from the bin.

This latest fundraise saw existing investors, the Swedish investment firm, VNV Global, and the New York-based hedge fund, Lugard Road Capital, – become major investors in OLIO, supported by further funds from Accel, Octopus Ventures, Rubio, plus technology entrepreneur and Chair of Grimsby Town football club, Jason Stockwood, and the media entrepreneur and politician, Lord Waheed Alli.

DX Ventures (the VC arm of the food delivery firm, Delivery Hero), is a new, highly-strategic investor in the round. The partnership will enable OLIO to accelerate its international expansion plans, and to quickly grow the Food Waste Heroes Programme.

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OLIO’s Tessa Clarke said: “OLIO has grown five times over the last year, reflecting a step change that’s taken place, – as businesses and citizens look to be more sustainable and connect with their local communities. We’re beyond thrilled to have raised this capital from this brilliant set of investors who are backing our vision of reinventing consumption for more than one billion OLIOers by 2030.”

“We have this enormous ambition, because humanity cannot continue to puzzle over how to keep global warming within 1.5 degrees and feed a population of 10 billion – whilst continuing to throw away one third of the food we produce, and consuming it as if we have 1.75 planets. In solving these twin problems, we aim to build one of the most transformational companies of our generation,” she added.

Last year, Tesco became the latest retailer to join the scheme, with 2,700 UK stores now redistributing surplus food nearing its sell-by date via OLIO’s network.

“Demand from both UK and international businesses to help reduce their waste is at an all-time high, as they strive to meet their ESG commitments,” added Clarke. “Incoming enquiries from major retailers, grocery delivery services, and fast-food brands are coming in thick and fast. OLIO is one of the simplest, most cost-effective ways an organisation can achieve zero food waste.”

As well as connecting neighbours to give away food and other household items, OLIO also has a ‘MADE’ section for users to buy and sell local homemade food and handmade crafts. ‘GOALS’ showcases over 100 simple swaps to live more sustainably, and the business plans to launch brand new features, ‘BORROW’ and ‘WANTED,’ within the next six months.

Duncan McIntyre, the Managing Partner at DX Ventures said: “We are excited to back Tessa, Saasha and the OLIO team, as we are strongly aligned with the sustainability mission of the company. Having built a solid and fast growing community of users, OLIO is tackling the global food waste problem in a scalable and sustainable way. OLIO has an incredibly well-loved product, and with this partnership, we look forward to helping OLIO grow and expand.”

Half of all food added to the app is requested within 21 minutes of posting. Since launch OLIOers have shared 25 million portions of food, which has had an environmental impact equivalent to taking 75 million car miles off the road, has saved 3.8 billion litres of water, and prevented 22k tonnes of CO2 equivalent emissions.

Find out more here: https://olioex.com