Over 350 M&S Food stores will start offering Too Good To Go ‘Surprise Bags’ of surplus bakery products, helping customers find quality food at reduced prices while also cutting food waste.

With food waste remaining a significant challenge, around 40% of all the food produced around the world is wasted, amounting to as much as 2.5billion tonnes each year. In the UK, WRAP estimates that around 10.7million tonnes of food are wasted annually.

The national launch follows a trial in a select number of M&S stores and is the latest move in its efforts to cut food waste. Customers can order their Surprise Bags through the Too Good To Go app and collect them Monday to Saturday, one hour before their local store closes.

“Too Good To Go is a brilliant example of how we’re turning our commitment to reducing food waste into practical action,” said Lucinda Langton, Head of Sustainability at M&S Food. “The response from our trial stores has been outstanding, and this partnership is another positive step towards our goal of halving food waste by 2030.”

“Food waste is a huge challenge, but partnerships like this show how simple it can be for businesses and consumers to take action together,” Chelsea Kerr, MD of Too Good To Go UK&I, added. “By giving food that might otherwise go unsold another chance to be enjoyed, we’re making it easier for people to save good food while also getting great value.”

The partnership with Too Good To Go sits alongside M&S’s wider Plan A programme to halve food waste by 2030. Last week, M&S announced that over 130million meals have been donated from surplus food being redistributed to charities through its partnership with Neighbourly.