FAQ

All the information about events’ details (time & place) is written on the Facebook event on our page. You have to come at 13:00 to get a symbol/queue ticket (fruits/veggies), which will later on determine your place in the queue. The order in which people are called in is posted right before the event starts between 13:00 and 13:30. The queue tickets are distributed in a random order, and the order in which we call them in is also random and changes every week, so that all the different people rotate in their position in the queue. This is done so that the distribution of food is as fair as possible.

We allow people to enter in groups, divided by the category of fruits or veggies/ symbol on their queue tickets.

We have two share/distribution points: 

Karens Minde Kulturhus (Wagnersvej 19, 2450 København) for the Wednesday events.

Osramhuset (Valhalsgade 4, 2200 København) for the Saturday events.

Yes, you do not have to pay for anything. However, donations to help us run the foodsharing events are more than welcome, since we need to cover transportation from our suppliers to events’ locations, venues expenses, as well as to buy some minor things such as trash bags, gloves or pay for the printing. 

We suggest 10-20 kr donations, which helps keeping us going, and more if you can, so we can invest into expanding as well: building up a bigger community and being able to create more awareness on the matter of food waste and partner up with more supermarkets so that we can save as much of the food surplus as possible..

The event finishes when all food is gone, so we cannot say for sure the exact time. However, it usually lasts for 1 – 2 hours. The event will therefore start from around 13:00 when we hand out queue tickets until about 15:00, when all the people have gone through and taken some food for themselves and all the food surplus has been re-distributed.

We collect the food from wholesalers, supermarkets and bakeries. We approach businesses in Copenhagen to help them out with the redistribution of food that has been labeled as food waste even though is perfect to eat. We prevent food surplus from reaching dumpsters.

Usually we have vegetables, fruits and bread and it is really hard to define the freshness of these but they are good and edible. The food is also sorted out by our volunteers so the bad/moldy food items we might receive are discarded. You could have a look at photos from the previous events to have a better understanding of what it looks like.

It varies from time to time, maybe from 20% to 80%, to give a rough statistic. We also mix organic and non-organic food in the boxes, as do not have the logistics in place to do this extra sorting out and we believe all food deserves to be saved, organic or not.

We strongly recommend first to share your food with your relatives, friends or neighbours. Another option is to announce that information in our Facebook group and people will come to take the food from you. 

In accordance to FVT (Food safety) regulations, we cannot redistribute food from individual/private donors at our foodsharing events.

Mostly yes, as most of the food surplus redistributed at our events is fruits and vegetables. However, not all the food is vegan since we have bread and pastry, for instance. In short, we do not limit ourselves to vegan food only, but no meat products are shared either. We share food that does not require refrigeration, as we do not have certificates and right equipment for that.

There are no strict limits, but one bag per person is the common consensus. We do our best with the resources we have to share the food in the most fair manner. So if we do not have a big amount of a particular fruit/veggie, then only take the minimum amount, and listen to our volunteers who will tell you that you can only take fx. one piece of it (e.g., one cucumber, or a handful of strawberries). 

We believe that it is important that people do not come to our events with a shopping list, or with a greedy attitude. Do not take more than you need and do not take more than you can handle, as it just is against our core principles if you will take too much food from the events, only to end up throwing it in the trash at home. 

We must be mindful of fairly sharing the food amongst all of us.

Yes. If you have any problems when you come, please ask the volunteers for assistance.

Yes. If you have any problems when you come, please ask the volunteers for assistance.

We aim to reduce food waste across the current food chain by raising awareness among households and businesses to the fact that food surplus should be shared instead of thrown away.

Foodsharing is unconditional in that we share our surplus food with everyone regardless of background or circumstance. Our events focus on rescuing food surplus from becoming food waste, the fact that we get a bag of free food as a consequence is a benefit of it, but not the main goal. We are here to share the food with everyone – no background checks.

There are also other organisations in Denmark already supporting, the homeless, shelters and similar. If we have surplus that they can use we pass it onto them. However the regulations regarding donating food to these organisations are complicated and in many cases they cant accept it. They recieve most of their food though the Foedevarebanken (the food bank)

Foodsharing is a grassroots movement so it does not have one individual at the root of it. It has appeared on self-organisation principles. That being said, there are a core group of people who started and put into place this initiative in Copenhagen.

First, you have to register as a volunteer here. Once you have done that, you will receive an email with some further information, and you can use our volunteer scheduling platform, VolunteerLocal to pick a shift. Better use both links from the computer to avoid errors.

You will receive an email confirmation (if you entered your email address correctly, so please pay attention to that), as well as a confirmation text message from the shift leader on the shift you signed up for a day before your shift. Please read the shift description carefully before deciding to sign up for a shift, so you know what is expected of you.

No, you can still be a volunteer. Do not worry about not being able to speak Danish because most of our volunteers are international and our main communication language is English.

Volunteers spend approximately 10-15 minutes while collecting bread + your trip back and forth of course. Usually you take only as much you can handle (it is recommended to have a huge backpack, IKEA bags or come with a cargo bike). You should bring the bread between 11:00 and 12:00 on the event day.

The bookings will be announced a day or two before the event on our Facebook page. Reservation prior to that is not possible!

Events will always be posted on Facebook and most likely if there’s nothing there it’s because no ones made the event yet. Our events run every Monday, Wednesday and Saturday unless otherwise stated.