You should let the pantry know as well. They can be a force that could change this. They can let folks that go to the pantry know not to go to those kind of gas stations and also have them call corporate.
Joe should see a lawyer about a wrongful termination lawsuit.
The Bill Emerson Good Samaritan Food Donation Act (pdf) brought to law in 1996 shields most liability for people donating food exactly like he did.
This may have been a knee-jerk reaction from the employer incorrectly assuming they could be liable if someone got sick. Though its also possible they’ve been looking for a reason to dismiss a long time employee to replace him with a cheaper one. Corporate ownership makes me leans towards the latter.
Liability if the food is bad. He was fired because the company perceives it as theft. The act does not cover that.
Same reason grocery stores toss perfectly good food in locked dumpsters in lieu of donating it.
The only chain place with fresh food that donates their extra at the end of the day is Panera.
And this is exactly why by law Italian supermarkets have to donate anything approaching its sell-by date.
Oh fuck. We need that law in the states.
They’ll get there. The US is still working through the Italian playbook. They’re up to the 1930s.
On the surface it seems like you’re being encouraging. Too bad i’ve skimmed a history book at least once in my life.
A manager doesn’t have discretion to dispose of out of date stock in any other way than putting it in the bin?
Why would you even have the position of Manager then?
The general corporate answer is that the misappropriation of waste is theft. They’ll try to propose that Joe might hide boxes of cookies to take them, causing disproportionate waste. Giving them to the pantry instead of keeping them for himself is immaterial to their rules.
Realistically, some companies move near-out-of-date products to the sale rack and then offer them up to pantries after they pass their best-by date. They should easily be able to look at waste and sales here and make a judgment call. I’m betting someone local had a beef with Joe, didn’t get their preferred day off, and turned him in.
Handled correctly, corporate would have donated a shit ton to the food pantry, taken a tax break, improved the community and told Joe to cut it out if they really cared.
Didn’t Eskimos throw sociopaths off cliffs?
Why doesn’t the conversation end there?
Begging your pardon, but Eskimo is considered pejorative. The people in question called themselves Inuit.
Not considered.
Is.
Lots of rules like this in large corporate outfits.
If you think this is crazy look into musical instrument disposal policies. It’s disgusting
I tried but got a lot of hits on positive sounding stuff. I believe you, I just don’t see what you’re seeing.
So the manager in the original post probably brought some day old baked goods that would have been thrown in the garbage. The gas station I worked at had a lock on the bin so people wouldn’t easily rummage through the bins for things like day old goods. Because it causes problems downstream to clean up after people dumpster dive. The other thing that can happen is something dumb happens somewhere, and some senior management (maybe even VP) sends out a memo that bans anyone from doing anything but what is now written policy. Lowest common denominator situation.
Basically upper management doesn’t trust boots on the ground so they make broad sweeping rules that they strictly enforce.
I’m no longer allowed to use a work vehicle when running errands and also stop by a drive through even though that exact process was described as “managers discretion” in the policy/procedure.
… Because one person elsewhere got rear-ended in a drive through, all 250+ branches of my company can no longer allow it’s delivery drivers to pick up food on the way back to branch.
I’m assuming the person in the original post has a policy in place that is exactly saying don’t do what he did
