According to the grocer’s annual sustainability report, in 2022 MOM’s Organic Market donated the equivalent of $1 million in food waste to DC-area nonprofits.
Grocers don’t sell everything in the produce aisle until it’s past its prime, but Rockville, Maryland-based MOM’s Organic Market doesn’t let food past its prime go to the trash.
According to the grocer’s annual sustainability report, it donated the equivalent of $1 million in food waste to DC-area nonprofits by 2022. That included more than 60 food banks, soup kitchens and churches.
MOM’s also runs a huge recycling program for customers in its stores, and its annual report says customers recycled 38 tonnes of batteries last year; 11.5 tons of shoes; 4,800 old mobile phones and tablets; and 30,000 oyster shells.
Last year, MOM’s began charging customers 25 cents for single-use paper bags and donating proceeds to the Anacostia Watershed Society in Bladensburg, Maryland. It banned single-use plastic bags in 2005, the first grocery store to do so. As a result, it says it avoided nearly 3.8 million single-use bags by 2022.
It was also the first retail chain to ban the sale of plastic bottled water in 2010. All of its stores have been powered by 100% renewable energy since 2005.
MOM’s has 16 stores in DC, Maryland and Virginia and recently expanded to New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts and Pennsylvania.
The company dates back to 1987, when founder Scott Nash sold organic produce from his family garage in Beltsville.
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