Ikea UK turns surplus fruit into juice to spotlight food waste

Ikea UK is launching a limited-edition apple juice brand dubbed Great British Bin Juice, crafted entirely from surplus fruit. The initiative serves as a tangible centerpiece for the retailer’s broader strategy to combat food waste, combining playful product marketing with data-driven kitchen technology and consumer education workshops.

The campaign highlights the company's reliance on AI-powered tools developed alongside Winnow. By tracking discarded items by weight and cost in real-time, Ikea has reportedly saved over £14 million in a decade while cutting carbon emissions equivalent to removing 2,300 cars from the road. This technical approach is now being extended to the customer experience, with each juice bottle featuring a QR code that provides a 20% discount on the retailer’s 365+ food storage containers.

Beyond the product launch, Ikea is hosting 'Waste Not, Want Not' workshops across select locations, including Birmingham, Bristol, and London’s Oxford Street, from June 6th to 13th. These sessions focus on meal preparation and ingredient repurposing, reflecting a wider industry shift toward circular food systems. Karen Hughes, Country Food Manager at Ikea UK, noted that the project aims to transform the perception of overlooked ingredients, while WRAP’s Jen Emerton praised the data-led model as a blueprint for reducing the economic and environmental costs of edible waste.