Written by SKC expanded its existing Lean program by incorporating Sustainability (Lean and Green) into a pilot project to focus on cafeteria waste, which accounted for over half of the company’s non-hazardous waste. Although the team initially assumed the issue was kitchen overproduction, their data collection and analysis revealed the root cause was behavioral: employees were taking more food than they could eat, leading to waste at the tray return area.
The problem would need to be resolved as a cultural issue regarding how people interacted with the food service.
SKC partnered with Sodexo to implement countermeasures focused on the customer, such as improving menu visibility with digital tools and sharing data to make the impact of waste visible.
These efforts resulted in a 40% reduction in waste at the tray return, allowing the company to decrease garbage collection frequency and generate financial savings with virtually no initial investment.
The project reinforced the strategic principle of reducing waste first before recycling, proving that Lean rigor is a powerful tool for solving environmental challenges and fostering collaborative cultural shifts.
You can read the entire article at https://www.planet-lean.com/articles/seeing-waste-differently-lean-green-in-skcs-cafeteria