Julie Poitras-Saulnier: Circular Economy Project That Aims To Reduce Food Waste

LOOP Mission is a circular economy project that aims to reduce food waste by repurposing the outcasts of the food industry. In a nutshell, we save fruits and veggies that are rejected because they don’t have the proper size, shape, or have a shelf life that is too short to survive the full cycle of distribution.

We transform them into awesome cold pressed juices, and so much more! We also craft sour beers with day-old bread, distill gin using potato cuttings from a potato chip company and make handcrafted soap from rejected cooking oil.

Since the company was founded in 2016, it has continued to grow and receive both local and international recognition. LOOP Mission has saved more than 8,035 tons of fruits and veggies, 482 million liters of water and avoided the emission of 6,411 tons of GHGs.

Tell us about yourself?

It all started with a phone call from Frédéric Monette, Vice-President of Operations at Courchesne Larose, a century old, family-run fruit and vegetable distributor in Eastern Canada.

In 2016, Monette called us and said that they were throwing away 16 tons of fruits and vegetables every single day, 365 days a year. I was working as a Sustainability Specialist in the food industry and David Côté, my partner, was working full time in the two other businesses that he also cofounded; a raw vegan fast food chain and a kombucha company.

When we heard about that food waste issue, we quickly left everything from our respective projects in order to start LOOP Mission.

If you could go back in time a year or two, what piece of advice would you give yourself?

First of all, believe in yourself. Secondly, partner up with people you love and that you see yourself having a beer with!

Finally, don’t start a business out of a desire of just success, but out of a desire to solve a problem. Often, the first motivation is to make money.

That’s the wrong path because you get exhausted and not really excited about what you’re doing.

What problem does your business solve?

LOOP Mission is a circular economy company that reduces food waste by repurposing the outcasts of the food industry. In a nutshell, we save fruits and veggies that are rejected because they don’t have the proper shape, size, or a shelf life that is long enough to survive the distribution cycle.

We transform them into fantastic products like smoothies, cold-pressed juices and probiotic sodas. The residual pulp from our juice factory is reused to make vegan dog treats and pizza crusts!

We also have beers made with day-old bread, a gin that upcycles potato cuttings from a potato chips company, and soaps that give a second life to cooking oil from a vegan fast food chain.

What is the inspiration behind your business?

When we heard about that food waste issue mentionned above, we quickly left everything from our respective projects in order to start LOOP Mission. LOOP mission was created out of the desire to create a business where the more you sell, the more good you do in the world.

What is your magic sauce?

Our mission for starters and being a circular economy business! As for our products, our flavors profile is very different because we work with overstock so we have access to a wide variety of fruits and vegetables and we are not limited to selecting them for their cost.

What is the plan for the next 5 years? What do you want to achieve?

The vision at LOOP is always to be a world leader in the fight against food waste and make a permanent change in the way we do things in the food industry. We aspire to teach and help other businesses to look at their waste and find ways to repurpose them.

We also want to show the consumer’s how versatile those ingredients can be by making delicious and nutritious products in every category and aisles of their favorite supermarket.

What is the biggest challenge you’ve faced so far?

In the pandemic, we had to quickly turn ourselves around and create a transactional online shop.That was definitely a challenge! Also in the midst of the pandemic, we experienced a labor shortage where it was really difficult to fill all of our available positions.

How do people get involved/buy into your vision?

Over the years, LOOP Mission has become the emergency call center for members of the food industry stuck with surpluses that, without our help, would end up in a landfill. If you are a food processor and you want to incorporate perfectly imperfect food in your products or have an overstock of produce, give us a call or shoot us an email at [email protected]