Abstract
This paper aims to (1) discuss the phenomenon of food waste occurrence on a retail and wholesale stage and (2) to identify procedures for redistributing edible food waste to charitable organisations, i.e. social redistribution. Based on the food waste and retail operations literature, we investigate store operations processes related to food waste based on 32 semi-structured interviews with managers who represent five dominant retail and wholesale formats. Based on multiple coding procedures, we provide structured insights into redistribution processes for retail, wholesale, and charitable organisations. The contribution of this research is that it adds conceptual and empirical insight to the discussion of edible food waste and its social redistribution from the perspective of the distribution stage.